


Our Lives On Holiday

by ashkatom



Series: OLOHverse [2]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Sgrub Session, Ensemble Cast, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-02
Updated: 2015-09-23
Packaged: 2017-11-20 02:37:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 28
Words: 145,765
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/580357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ashkatom/pseuds/ashkatom
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wherein a debt is called, FLARP is played, and suddenly Sollux Captor finds himself in the middle of a terribly-planned coup. Contains caste politics, an incredible amount of snark, an inadvisable basement operating theatre, quite a lot of relationship drama, and too many fucking pesterlogs since our hero never leaves his hive.</p><p>==> Play the game</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Yet more promptfic! One day, I will finish these. One day...
> 
> "EriSol, nerdy larping. Eridan ropes Sollux into running around in costume with some friends. Bantering back and forth, geeky puns and jokes about weapons being overcompensation… ‘Hold the fort’ ends up being ‘making out in the fort’? >u> I’m just a sucker for nerds smooching."

  
\-- caligulasAquarium [CA] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   
CA:  sol   
CA:  sol pick up your goddamn fingers an do yourself the favvour a respondin   
CA:  i got a proposition for you   
TA:  fuck, agaiin?   
TA:  ii’m piickiing up my fiinger2 riight now ed   
TA:  ii think you know whiich one2   
TA:  leave me alone   
CA:  your fuckin shameful behavviour aside, it ain’t a romantic situation an you can sit on your fingers an swwivvel for all a the fucks i givve   
CA:  i got a flarp game comin up   
TA:  no   
TA:  hell no   
TA:  drag vk iinto your 2hiitty deathwii2h, ii have thiing2 two do before ii diie   
CA:  listen to the wwhole thing before you go harin off sol   
CA:  its no casualties an vvris doesnt wwant anythin to do wwith it   
CA:  havvin a psionic wwould let me wwipe the floor wwith these assholes   
TA:  wow   
TA:  lii2ten two the 2ound of me not cariing   
CA:  an   
CA:  you owwe me   
TA is offline!   
CA:  oh fuck you sol   
CA:  its at one tomorroww   
CA:  fuckin be there   
\-- caligulasAquarium [CA] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   


\--

Despite how much you don’t want to be, you are at the FLARP site at one, nursing a migraine and a pile of regrets. Both are well-documented traits of having to deal with Eridan Ampora. He’s already there, scouting out a formation of rocks that you could not give less of a fuck about. Except, whoops, that’s incorrect because here come the other FLARP team. Critical apathy mass has been reached, prepare for a global shortage of who even cares.

The other team, apparently. You thought Eridan was a douche for the whole cape-and-ancestor-worship FLARPing, but wow, these guys take the grubcake. They’re decked out in enough jewellery to make a seadweller roll their eyes, symbols everywhere. One’s a tealblood with wide, swooping lines painted on her face and down her arms, matching the pattern of her clothes. Trying too hard to be an adult, you decide. The greenblood with her actually looks uncomfortable with the getup. Sucker bet that he’s in the same situation as you.

“About fuckin’ time you showed up,” Eridan sneers, one hand on his hip.

“Not my fault you can’t tell the time,” the tealblood sneers right back.

You have never hated your life more.

\--

You never realised how boring FLARP could be. Whenever AA talked about it, it was all exciting adventures and finding secrets and epic battles. Now it’s you, stuck in a pile of rocks, while Eridan stalks in ever-widening circles around your base. Ahab’s Crosshairs, turned down to non-lethal sol i fuckin swwear, glows dimly, and you hope it gives away your position so this can be over and done with and you can go lock yourself back in your hivestem for another few months.

Your phone buzzes.

  
\-- apocalypseArisen [AA] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   
AA:  sollux   
AA:  i am beginning to worry about you!   
AA:  youve been idle for a while   
TA:  iit2 cool aa   
AA:  0_0 he speaks!   
TA:  hell ii went for the hat triick twoniight   
TA:  ii left the hiive2tem   
AA:  ok   
AA:  now im really worried   
AA:  who are you and what have you done with my moirail   
TA:  kiilled hiim for all hii2 2weet gear   
AA:  0_0 the dreaded upgrade murderer   
AA:  i should have known   
AA:  but really why are you out   
TA:  long 2tory   
TA:  ed roped me iintwo a flarp game   
AA:  sollux!!!   
AA:  i thought we said no more flarp!   
TA:  yeah but ii owed hiim   
TA:  2orry aa   
TA:  iit’2 no ca2ualtiie2 and no vk   
TA:  plu2 ii am liiterally hiidiing iin a piile of rock2, flarp ii2 2o lame.   
AA:  its not that lame!   
AA:  i suppose if its no casualties i can forgive you this one time   
AA:  and since you’re already out of your hivestem you should make the most of it   
TA:  yeah ii’m gettiing food after   
AA:  i dont mean efficiency you idiot   
AA:  have some fun   
AA:  i bet youre just sitting around and moping   
AA:  its more fun if you get into it and really try to win    
AA:  and as much of a jerkbag eridan is hes actually a good player 0u0   
TA:  we agreed that face look2 2tupiid   
AA:  your face looks stupid!!!   
AA:  now go have fun and stop talking to me   
\-- apocalypseArisen [AA] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   
TA:  wow piity you two aa   


You stare at your phone for a moment before shoving it back in your pocket and sticking your head out of your rocky fort. As much as it sucks, AA is always right. You have a choice as to whether you want to sit around and sulk while trying to chat to people on your phone, which is frustrating at the best of times, or you can play FLARP.

 _iit’2 on, biitche2_.

\--

You are honestly surprised that psionics aren’t banned from FLARP because holy shit, this game is easy. You have the vague notion that there’s a campaign of some sort running and you should be playing a role, but fuck a bunch of that shit, you’re _building_. AA’s the one who can terraform, between the two of you, but it’s not exactly hard to stack up more rocks and make a shitty pulley door. You’re lazing on a rough parapet when Eridan returns from his latest scout.

For once in his life he is actually unable to speak. Then the glorious moment passes. “What the _fuck_ , Sol, I was gone _half an hour_.”

“I built a better bathe,” you say. “It’th capture the bathe, right? We’re completely impregnable.”

“I can see that, on account a’ how I can’t get in!” Eridan gestures at the pit of spikes you installed. “Some a’ us can’t float in mid-air, Captor!”

You pick him up and deposit him on the other side of the spike pit, no harm done. And maybe watching him squawk was fun. “I’m thtill conthidering a drawbridge,” you inform him. “I don’t really have the mechanicth to build one out here.”

He’s already inside your rock fort, confronted by the stairs - which at least you did remember- “There are _floors_ ,” he says.

“Hell yeth there are floorth, we can collapth the thtairth if we need a latht thtand.” You follow him up, floating because picking up your legs requires effort.

He stops to look at you. With the only light coming from his rifle and your psionics, he looks... different. None of you have moulted yet, even KK isn’t near moulting, but Eridan looks like he’s halfway there in this light, sharp cheekbones with deep shadows, glasses reflecting your blue-red dimly. His mouth is drawn tight, his posture just as strict.

He actually cares about this, you realise with a sinking feeling, slouching deeper and folding your arms across your chest in preparation for what’s to come. He likes pretending to be Dualscar and sinking into his fake little world where he’s king, because one world apparently isn’t enough.

“Sol...”

“Can it, ED. AA told me to have fun, tho I’m having fun.”

“You coulda said no,” Eridan points out.

Something stops you from pulling the clearly-you’ve-never-had-a-moirail card. Since his messy thing with Feferi blew up, it’s been the perfect knife to get him off your back, but...

Fuck, you were enjoying doing something constructive that wasn’t fighting with lines of code for once and you’re not letting go of it just yet.

“Yeah, but I didn’t,” you say, and reach out to shove him up the steps. “Move your gluteth, ED, before the other team murder uth.”

As soon as you shove him he’s just an eight-sweep-old pupa again, dressed in a too-large cape and playing a game for girls, as KK puts it. You think you like it better that way.

\--

The tealblood comes to scope out your fort when Eridan’s off searching for theirs. You spare a moment of platonic pity for the greenblood, who is definitely playing the role of Guy Roped Into This Shit and doesn’t even have a rad base to make up for it.

“Hey!” you call out, and wave from the top of your fort, because nobody can actually make you take this seriously. If you want battlements, you can have some fucking battlements.

Her head snaps up and her eyes narrow. “You don’t want to be here,” she says. “I’ll give you twenty bucks to surrender the fort.”

You punt her a few metres away. Twenty bucks? For _your_ fort? You will rot in a helmsblock before you sell out your fort for twenty bucks. “You know, ED’th probably making the thame offer to your guy,” you call out to her. “And have you theen the shit he wearth? He can afford a dethent bribe.”

She races off and you recline on your battlements, full of smug. You’re starting to see why FLARP is so popular.

\--

Eridan comes back ten minutes later, well into a game of Angry Cawbeasts. He’s even more smug than you, straightening his cape in the most theatrical manner possible as he waits expectantly for you to ask him why he’s so full of himself all of a sudden.

“Tho you bribe the greenblood or what?”

He’s startled for a second, then surprises you with a smile. “Sol, I didn’t take you for a tactician.”

You roll your eyes before realising that he can’t tell. Then you roll them again and take extra pleasure in knowing he can’t tell.

“But no, I didn’t bribe him.” He leans on the parapet next to you. “I decided to pull a covert mission an’ disable their base.”

“You w-” you get out, before an explosion to the east interrupts you. Eridan’s smile turns sharp and pleased, and you reach out and _shake_ him. His fucking doomsday machines, how could you forget? “You idiot! You thaid thith wath no casualtieth!” Before he can reply, you shoot up into the air to try to get a better look. There’s a thin column of smoke rising a couple kilometres away.

Eridan shouts after you, but you ignore him. There has to be something you can- your phone buzzes again, and dread hits you in the stomach like a four-day coding bender, leaving you sick and dizzy. How are you going to explain this to AA?

  
\-- caligulasAquarium [CA] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   
CA:  sol you blitherin idiot   
CA:  i fuckin said disable their base an i meant it   
CA:  i used ahabs to drill dowwn an buried the bomb   
CA:  the most it wwould a done is givve them a scare an maybe knocked ovver some shit   
CA:  noww get your fuckin ass back dowwn here an help me prepare before i cull someone for real   
CA:  god you fuckin lowwbloods i swwear   
\-- caligulasAquarium [CA] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   


You hang in mid-air and look back at the explosion site. The smoke is already clearing away. Trees are still standing, and you can’t see much damage to the surroundings from where you are.

You contemplate dropping something on Eridan. Instead you stay aloft and breathe, and watch the site. Only when you see two figures moving around do you sink back to terra firma. Eridan is waiting for you, arms folded and foot tapping as if he has a right to be angry.

“You could have killed thomeone,” you snap, skipping the niceties.

His expression goes even more sour than it was. “Some a’ us don’t waste our nights on the computer, Sol. I ain’t inexperienced with explosive devices.”

“Look at what happened to TV the latht time thomething got out of control!” you continue, as if he said nothing. Sparks are lighting up your fingertips, and you should rein yourself in, but you _can’t_. “And VK’s mithing an arm, and TZ’th thun-blind, and AA wath almotht killed!” You reach out and rip the cape away from his neck. “And you want to thtart it all again becauthe you can’t get over your little power fantathy and you don’t care about anyone half ath much ath you care about yourthelf!”

He snatches the cape back, stares you down deliberately, and slowly rips it in half. “Don’t you fuckin’ presume,” he says, and the tremor of anger in his voice holds you back. “Don’t you fuckin’ _dare_ presume what my reasons for doin’ this are, Captor.” He drops the bifurcated cape. “Not carin’ about anythin’ is your problem, not mine.”

The blood pounding in your ears has faded now, and you put the pieces together. It’s embarrassing, how long it’s taken you. Even Vriska stopped FLARPing  regularly sweeps ago, not long after The Incident. Eridan’s the only one who’s kept at it.

“FF?” you ask.

He shakes his head, pushes his glasses up and grinds a palm into his eyes tiredly. “Gl’bgolyb,” he says. “We’re nearin’ Ascension, there ain’t anyone else Fef can trust to feed her who wants the job. An’ someone has to keep all a’ you alive.”

Now you feel kind of awful. Sure, you haven’t been fucking around on a computer all this time, you’ve been looking for a way to get KK past the drones ( _if FF loses her showdown with the Condesce, you have to be realistic_ ) and to Ascension, trying to reach out to FF’s supporters safely, and trying to keep everyone you care about from becoming a voice in your head, but Eridan’s been single-handedly gathering food for Gl’bgolyb, no easy task. And apparently it’s because he’s trying to keep you all alive.

Fuck. Sometimes you forget you’re friends with this douchebag.

“Tho their luthii are forfeit?” you ask.

“Yeah,” he says. “An’ if you’re goin’ to bitch at me about that, you can shove it, Sol, I ain’t got time to soothe your fragile fuckin’ feelin’s.”

Fear grips you suddenly. If their lusii are forfeit... “What about our luthii?”

He huffs. “I put in a bunch a’ jewellery instead, I ain’t fuckin’ heartless.”

“Alright,” you say. “Fine. We’re going to win thith and keep uth alive a while longer.” You pick up the remains of the cape and bundle it into his arms. “Then you’re going to go to KN and get her to fix thith, if FLARPing ith the only way you can get luthii. You need to keep up your foppish reputation.”

Eridan gapes at you. “Sol?”

You throw your hands in the air. “I don’t like it, but Gl’bgolyb needth food, tho fine, whatever! Get moving, ED, it’th been a while and they’re probably coming.”

“Yeah,” he says, dumbly. Then, “Fuck, yeah, get up and keep a lookout, Captor, there’s a chance they won’t come in an’ surrender to us like they damn well should.” He captchalogues his cape and gives you a firm shove. “Don’t let them shoot you in the face.”

\--

The greenblood comes lurking not long after, taking the proceedings seriously now that it seems there’s a real possibility of losing his lusus. You feel... horrible, but Gl’bgolyb needs feeding, and there’s no way around it.

You pretend you don’t notice him, and change the colour of the sparks you’re playing with to blue. Eridan, out in the trees and unseen, starts circling to meet your intruder. You leave him to it and keep an eye out for the tealblood instead. A few minutes later, Eridan drags in the greenblood, gagged and bound.

“Theriouthly?” you say.

“If I hadn’t’a gagged him, he would’a screamed,” Eridan says.

“This game ith tho fucked up,” you say, and ungag the greenblood. “Look, jutht thurrender and tell uth where your partner ith. You’ve already lotht, tho let’th not drag it out.”

He caves. You think of Bicyclops and wince to yourself.

\--

It doesn’t take Eridan long to hunt down the tealblood. You can see why AA said he was a good player; with Ahab’s Crosshairs in hand, his explosives, and his ability to stalk people down, you wouldn’t want to cross him in a casualty match.

She kicks and screams the whole way back, it seems from Eridan’s expression, as he drags her into your fort. He ties her up next to her partner and glowers down at them, bringing all his violetblooded holier than thou to bear.

The greenblood starts crying without noticing, tears rolling down his cheeks one by one.

“Eridan...” you say.

“It’s gotta be done, Sol.” He crouched next to the tealblood. “Now, we can do this the nice way, where you get to say goodbye an’ cull ‘em yourself, or you can make me hunt down your lusus, an’ I ain’t gonna be happy if I gotta do that.”

The tealblood nods once, jerkily.

“Right. Good.” Eridan rolls up his sleeves. “Sol, be a darlin’ an’ guard the other one while I take care a’ this.”

\--

You expect Eridan to bitch you out when he makes it back to the fort, a black eye forming that just narrowly missed being a broken nose by the looks of it. The greenblood is long gone, heeding the wisdom of your curt advice to get the hell out.

You’re entirely surprised when Eridan slumps down against the wall to sit and closes his eyes. “Figured you’d tell him to piss off,” he says.

Tired and numb, you sit beside him, and don’t even complain when he falls over sideways and his head lands in your lap. He can’t sleep against the wall, thanks to his horns. “Why didn’t you thtop me?”

“Saved me the trouble a’ looking like a sap,” he says. “’Preciate your help, Captor.”

You lean your head back against the wall and don’t bother responding. Some time later, when you think he might have actually fallen asleep on you, you say, “Thith ith hoofbeathtshit,” out loud.

“I don’t disagree.” You look down to see Eridan looking up at you. He looks himself, now, instead of some faded imitation of his ancestor, or a scared kid playacting. There’s a long, still silence where he just looks at you, then he hesitantly reaches up and runs a thumb across your lips. It seems too tender for hate and you don’t know what to say.

The problem is solved for you when, not meeting any resistance, Eridan props himself up and kisses you. Your arms automatically go around him to support him and he presses into the kiss all the more, and in that instant you realise what it is to hate someone so thoroughly all you want to do is smother them down and follow them around to point out how stupid they’re being and all the ways they’re going to break themselves. This isn’t the screaming anger you felt at Vriska. For hate, it’s almost gentle. Insidious.

You didn’t know that falling in hate with someone else was going to feel like slicing yourself open.

Eridan pulls away from you and you don’t pull him back, for all you want to. “We gotta get Fef on the throne,” he says, as if that wasn’t a thing that just happened. “Otherwise all a’ this fuckery is gonna be nothin’.”

“You’ve got plans?” you ask.

“I got plans,” he says, and stretches luxuriantly.

You slide your hand under his shirt and rest it on his bare stomach, possessive. “So do I,” you say.

He grins at you, and at the implicit challenge. “Good,” he says, and that’s that.


	2. Chapter 2

  
CC: So )(ow’s it going wit)( Karcrab?   
TA: ugh dont even get me 2tarted on kk   
TA: he 2tiill refu2e2 two admiit anythiing ii2 wrong   
TA:  2ollux you fuck2quattiing bull2hiittiing piile of tra2h iit’2 not even goiing two matter untiil a2cen2iion 2o quiit riidiing my bulge over iit   
CC: )(a)(a! Sands like Karcrab!   
CC: Maybe he’s got his own plans? S---EACR-ET ones!   
TA: ii2 that a hiint   
CC: Naut reely. You know I don’t talk to )(im muc)(.   
CC: But Ascension its)(ellf isn’t suc)( a big fin, you know?   
CC: --Efin if I take over, it won’t be offis)(oal for sweeps and SW---E----EPS!   
CC: Naut until I can defeat Condesce.   
CC: Being conc)(est, Karcrab mig)(t be D-EAD by t)(en.   
TA: waiit w)(at   
TA: ff w)(at makes you thiink that   
CC: W)(ale, s)(e’s been gone FOR----EV---ER! S)(e probably doesn’t efin R-E---ELIS-E we’re at Ascension!   
CC: It’s going to be a w)(ile before s)(e can make it back from the ot)(er side of the UNIV---ERS----E.   
TA: holy 2hiit   
TA: ff do you not know how thii2 work2   
CC: W)(at do you minnow? 38/   
TA: 2he2 got a p2iioniic poweriing her 2hiip   
TA: 2he can go a2 fa2t a2 2he want2 iif 2he whiip2 them hard enough   
CC: W)(at?   
TA: dont what me   
TA: you know were ju2t batteriie2 and war machiine2   
TA: or what diid you ju2t thiink that aa and ii are paniickiing about a2cen2iion for 2hiit2 and giiggle2   
CC: I T)(OUG)(T you were worried about Karcrab!   
CC: And that Araydia was worried about Tavros!   
CC: Solelux, I have N-EV---ER t)(oug)(t of you as a battery!   
\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has ceased trolling cuttlefishCuller [CC] --   
CC: Sollux?   


Your hands are shaking.

You stand up with extreme deliberance, cross through your tiny hive to the nutrition block, and open the thermal hold. It’s embarassingly bare, with  only two large jars of honey, one half-empty. You’ll harvest your silicomb hives soon enough, but this should be enough to feed your lusus for the next few nights. You’ll probably have to order in some honey to tide things over until your bees produce enough to harvest again.

You decant some honey onto a plate, wide and shallow so Bicyclops doesn’t get his hand stuck in a jar like he did once in your fifth sweep. Instead of going up the shared staircase of the hivestem and forcing the door open, you climb out the window and push up against the sill.

Once you’ve fed him, Bicyclops is sedate. You take off the chains and replace them one by one after making sure they haven’t chafed or bruised him. The ritual and routine of the actions fills your mind, and you let yourself sink into it so you don’t have to think.

You’re brought out of it by your phone buzzing. Since Eridan is officially your kismesis now, you saw fit to give him unfettered access to you, and you and Aradia have worked out over the sweeps that you’ll still respond to your phone buzzing even if you’re stuck in a depressive episode.

It’s meant to be for if she – or Eridan, now – needs you. 

  
CA: is there a reason that fef   
CA: wwho hasnt said a goddamn wword to me after evverythin   
CA: is askin me about helmsmen   
CA: an is that reason sollux captor is an asshole   


You stare at your phone. Feferi told Eridan she’d stick a fork through his ribs if he ever spoke to her again. You think he redeemed himself a little, during the whole FLARP thing, and by still bringing her lusii, but...

The thing about Eridan is that he does things for his own gain. Feferi knows that better than anyone.

  
TA: what are you telliing her   
CA: wwell wwhen a hunk a metal an a psionic feel strongly about each other   
CA: wwhat the fuck do you think im tellin her   
CA: you need to talk to her about this   
TA: why   


There’s a long silence. You shove your phone back in your pocket and scratch Bicyclops’ right chin. He can pick up on your mood through lusii superpowers, and he’s starting to get riled up. You can feel the edges of a manic period coming on, and you don’t want to deal with this when you can’t stop words from flowing out your fingers.

Which really means you should deal with it now.

Your phone buzzes again and Bicyclops makes a displeased sound, a growl in stereo. You pat him as you read.

  
CA: because wwe had a fuckin gentlemans agreement sol   
CA: fef   
CA: throne   
TA: oh my god 2hut up   
CA: do you really wwant fef to be in charge wwithout knowwin wwhat she’s gettin into   
TA: here2 an iidea   
TA: how about you 2hut the fuck up over un2ecured connectiion2.   
CA: clearly im just talkin about our wweekly stitch an bitch sessions sol   
CA: get your panties outta a twwist   
TA: fuck you   
TA: fuck everythiing   
CA: so youll do it then   
TA: yes ii wiill fuckiing talk two ff   
TA: ii would have thought youd want that honour though   
CA: sol   
CA: one day i am goin to cut your fingers off so you cant keep usin them to shovve your foot in your mouth   


He goes offline after that. Things didn’t go well in Seadweller Reunion Land, then.

You double-check Bicyclops’ chains and take your plate back. On the way back down to your segment of the hivestem, you think of what to tell Feferi and how to say it.

You research Helmsmen. You do it out of a sick, sad compulsion to know exactly what will happen to you. You spent a night marking the points of your body where ports would be placed, of drawing lines around limbs and appendages that would be cut off. You have reams and reams of medical notes, psychothereaping notes, statistics on survival rates, studies on matching ships and subjects – you’d power a battleship, battery and war machine all in one, unless you can fake your power rating.

You know all this. There are walls built out of The Way It’s Always Been and the only way you can escape this fate is a complete revolution of Alternian society. The only way Aradia can escape this fate and be where she should be, on terra firma with mud ground into her skirt and trowel in hand, is a complete revolution.

Sometimes you think it might just be easier to go along with the way things are, but, perversely, you hear AA’s voice in your doom-prophet head sometimes and... it’s comforting. You want to keep hearing it, not have her lost forever to Helmsman duty. She never asks about her fate, and so you don’t listen too hard, but it’s still good to know that life will be normal for her, for whatever fucked-up version of normal exists for you two.

Trollian is blinking at you when you wake up your screen.  This is your life. It’s already not far removed from the life of a Helmsman.

  
\-- cuttlefishCuller [CC] started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   
CC: Would it be so bad?   
CC: W)(ale, I guess the fact that -Eridan won’t tell me a single fin means it would be!   
CC: But if it was voluntary. Would ANYON-E volunteer?   
TA is sending file 2uper2ecretre2earch2hiit.zip   
TA: 2tart wiith the thereapiing record2   
TA: #22 ii2 partiicularly exemplary   
TA: there are 2ummariie2   


You leave her to it. #22 ‘volunteered’ for Helmsman duty, so much as anyone can volunteer. She did it to stay close to her moirail. The moirail killed the Captain of her ship, took over through Dead Man’s Shoes, and dumped #22. #22, having been wired into a ship for a troll who no longer needed her, burned herself out in the middle of nowhere through a feedback loop that shouldn’t have existed. 

By the time the ship was found, floating in the middle of dead space, the only things left were the records.

  
\-- carcinoGeneticist [CG] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   
CG: SOLLUX, YOU BLITHERING SACK OF UNQUIET DEAD, IF YOU DO NOT RESPOND WITHIN THE NEXT FIVE SECONDS I’M GOING TO ASSUME THAT YOU’VE BECOME A REVENANT AND YOUR BUILDING NEEDS TORCHING BEFORE YOU SEDUCTIVELY MOAN ALL OF YOUR PLANS TO THE FIRST PUSTULE OF BAD SENSE THAT SHOWS CONCUPISCENT INTEREST IN YOUR ROTTED GLUTEAL FLESH DEPOSITS.   


After skimming KK’s screed, you have determined that he has heard the news about you and Eridan and does not particularly approve. You can’t resist yanking his chain a little more. It takes your mind off of Feferi’s new schoolfeeding subject, at least.

  
TA: wow kk the one thiing ii dont need and you got iit for me   
TA: you are the be2t at a2hen advance2   
TA: iit ii2 you   
CG: I AM SO DISGUSTED AND APPALLED BY THAT SUGGESTION THAT I THINK I JUST WENT PALE FOR YOU BECAUSE YOU THOUGHT IT WAS A VIABLE OPTION. PLEASE TELL ARADIA TO VACATE MY QUADRANT EFFECTIVE IMMEDIATELY, I NEED TO SHOOSHPAP YOUR DISGUSTING LISPY FACE.   
TA: ii would pay good money two 2ee you and aa fiightiing iit out over me   
CG: I KNOW YOU WOULD, YOU DEGENERATE. STOP TRYING TO DISTRACT FROM YOUR ROMANTIC FAILINGS BY POINTING OUT HOW YOU MAGICALLY FELL ASS-BACKWARDS INTO A PERFECT MOIRALLEGIANCE.   
TA: 2orry kk but aa made me 2iign a contract   
TA: ii have two 2ay how hot 2he ii2 at lea2t twiice a niight two you   
TA: ju2t you   
CG: FOR FUCK’S SAKE.   
TA: ii thiink 2he want2 two mudwre2tle   
CG: SOLLUX.   
TA: naked   
CG: NO.   
CG: FOCUS. ERIDAN AMPORA, RUINING MY PLANS TO RUN AWAY AND LIVE A FRUITFUL LIFE AMONGST THE CUD-CHEWERS, SCREWING OVER THE ONLY PERSON WHO WILL TALK TO YOU ABOUT YOUR FRANKLY DISTURBING SEDIMENTARY WANKBANK.   
TA: were a thiing ii gue22   
CG: YOU GUESS.   
TA: iidk kk   
CG: YOU *GUESS*.   
CG: DO YOU NOT KNOW IF YOU’RE SUBJECTING ME TO THE RISK OF BEING FOUND OUT BY A CASTEIST, GENOCIDAL IDIOT WITH MORE DOOMSDAY DEVICES THAN COMMON SENSE?   
CG: BECAUSE I WILL KILL MYSELF NOW. I WILL WALK INTO THE MOST POPULOUS AREA I KNOW AND TRY TO GET MY BLOOD ON AS MANY PEOPLE AS I CAN WHILE SCREAMING ABOUT NEVER BEING ACCEPTED. I WILL TURN MY DEATH INTO A MOVING AND TRAGIC EVENT THAT EVERYONE WILL SPEAK OF IN HUSHED TONES FOR SWEEPS TO COME. SOMEONE WILL START A FUNDRAISER.   
TA: kk you liike eriidan   
TA: you have moviie niight2 wiith hiim a2 often a2 you have coffee date2 wiith kn   
TA: you player   
TA: ii thought you wanted me pale   
CG: I WANT TO NEVER HAVE MET YOU.   
TA: iit2 fiine   
TA: ed2 not goiing two 2crew you over   
TA: a2 far a2 ii know he2 at the 2tage where he thiink2 youre ju2t weiird-weiird in2tead of mutant-weiird   
TA: iif youd tell me your 2ecret plan2 ii could make 2ure that nobody ii2 goiing two 2crew you over iincludiing me by acciident   
TA: or you could ju2t   
TA: you know   
TA: accept my help liike a 2en2iible troll   
TA: or tz2   
TA: or ed2   
TA: or anyone where you have an actual chance of not endiing up dead   
CG: WE’VE TALKED ABOUT THIS.   
TA: whoop2 ii gue22 were talkiing about iit agaiin   
TA: kk we both know iim the one wiith the 2hiitty deathwii2h 2o what2 your excu2e   
CG: IF I CAN’T MAKE IT ON MY OWN LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE DOES, IT DOESN’T COUNT.   
CG: ASCENSION IS WHEN WE’RE JUDGED.    
TA: tell me you dont have 2ome 2hiitty moviie plotliine fanta2y of beiing an underdog and proviing your2elf 2o iindii2pen2iible you cant be culled   
TA: hey ii have a tiitle for you when you manage two fiight your way through the rank2   
TA: ‘cullbaiit’   
CG: GET YOUR SAD EXCUSE FOR A THINKPAN UNDER CONTROL, CAPTOR.   
CG: AS THE POET ONCE SAID: CHECK YOURSELF BEFORE YOU WRECK YOURSELF.   
\-- carcinoGeneticist [CG] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   


You are fully capable of recognising that you could have managed that better. But somehow over the course of the last week - last night - last _hour_ , it’s become clear that something is going to have to be done. Letting something happen to AA would be like cutting your hands off, or losing your psionics. You cannot imagine life without KK’s dumb grey text screaming at you.

The problem is that you’re passive. You’ve been slowly worming your way into the Imperial networks, but the drone files are backed up and synched almost instantly. Any changes need to be authorised and the ciphers change daily. You can tell it’s a Vigenere cipher, but the keys are complex enough that your computer can’t crack them in the few hours while they’re useful. Even secretly tapping into your neighbours for CPU cycles doesn’t help. It’s time to turn your focus elsewhere, but you can’t think of another way to get KK through than changing his status with the drone system.

Well. That’s the backup plan. The one that will be implemented in the stead of deposing Her Imperial Condescension. Every time you consider how much you and your friends need Feferi to succeed, a thin spike of fear drives through you. It’s good, though. It keeps you sharp. Without it you’d let things go and let things go until Ascension is here.

There’s half a sweep until Ascension. You don’t think it’s going to be enough.

  
CC: I’m S)(OR-E somefin more comfortable can be made!   
CC: T)(is tech looks old 38/.   
TA: iit ii2 NOT ABOUT the tech   
CC: Sollux, I’m sorry.    
CC: I )(ave to be -Empress for -EV---ERYON-E, not just t)(e people I LIK-E.   
CC: We’ve colonised so muc)( of nearby space that taking away interstellar travel would ruin us!   
CC: I didn’t realise that the s)(ips were powered wit)( psionics, but t)(at doesn’t mean I can give t)(em up!   
CC: Wit)( time we can come up wit)( somefin betta.   


You stare blankly at the monitor. Time to a highblood means not in your lifetime. 

AA would be such a perfect Helmsman. All it would take would be for some highblood with enough cash for a ship and a bottle of chloroform and by the time you knew it would be too late, _again_. You can’t do anything for her even when your own neck is on the line.

She’d... well, she’d probably just pity you more if she knew that you were even trying to protect her. Even though your powers are flashier, AA’s are more dependable. They don’t fuzz out when she gets a migraine, or flare in manic periods. They don’t wane away in depressive spirals. She’s far better-equipped than you, moody half-functional boy who almost murdered his moirail.

You are the worst-equipped person for negotiating with an Empress.

You crack your fingers one by one as you stare at Feferi’s words. They refuse to change.

  
CC: Sollux, please stop going awave.   
CC: I need you, you know I do!    
CC: W)(at if you oversaw t)(e c)(anges to t)(e s)(ellmsman system?   


All of a sudden, you know what to do.

  
TA: not me   
TA: aa   
CC: Araydia? 38/   
CC: You know moor about t)(e )(elmsmen t)(an s)(e does, don’t you?   
TA: 2he can learn   
TA: let2 be hone2t   
TA: iif 2omeone wa2 made for beiing a mute piiece of hardware iit wa2 me   
TA: beiing a helm2man would kiill aa   
TA: 2he need2 freedom   
TA: you take her on a2 advii2or and 2he’2 2uddenly protected a2 fuck   
TA: fancy that   
CC: -EF--ERRYON-E )(as you two wrong, don’t t)(ey?   
CC: I wondered, you minnow. Ever since Eridan broug)(t )(er to me.   
CC: You almost krilled her! But you’re not t)(e one t)(at needs pacifying.   
CC: You’re working so )(ard just to make )(er )(appy!   
CC: It’s ADORABUBBL--E, for a guilt complex.   
TA: ju2t giive me a rea2on for wantiing you iin charge   
TA: giive me one 2iign iit2 not goiing two be meet the new bo22 2ame a2 the old bo22   
CC: I want to )(-ELP. It’s just going to be a long time, and t)(ere’s no c)(anging t)(at!   
CC: I PROMIS---E Aradia will N-EV-ER be a )(elmsman.   
CC: I PROMIS---E t)(at I will N-EV-ER make ANYON---E unwilling and uncompensated do t)(e job.   
TA: fiine   
TA: giive my re2earch two aa and tell her what you want   
TA: dont let her know iit came from me   


Feferi agrees, and you finger the faded lines of marker along your arms that lie along a neural pathway. AA will figure out who did the research and berate you eventually, but by then you’ll hopefully have made all the difference you can.

\--

The manic period hits hard later that night. You start six new ~ath projects and quit out of them after a few lines of code. You take ablutions and trim up your nails to make typing easier and run laundry to the shared hivestem facilities. You shamelessly open up the computers of everyone you know or who has ever shared a network with you and try another brute-force on the latest key, disguising the attack as heavy traffic to the shared storage - more specifically, the pale porn some idiot downloaded from the open net. You _love_ idiots.

  
CA: sol   
CA: are you evven fuckin alivve at this point   
CA: wwhats fef talkin to me for   
TA: ii’m great thank2 for a2kiing   
TA: ii talked two fef   
TA: fuck know2 why 2he’2 talkiing two you but hey don’t 2crew iit up   
CA: wwhat   
CA: howw   
CA: oh my god i hate you   
TA: you’re welcome   
TA: come over and do me a favour   


You meet Eridan at the door instead of just opening it with psionics, red and blue markers in hand. He’s confused when you hand them to him as you pull him inside, even more so as you pull your shirt over your head. The faint marks are still there from the last time you drew all over yourself, but even with a mirror and psionics it’s hard to do your back. This is where Eridan comes in.

“I come all a’ this way an’ you don’t even say hello,” he complains, unwinding his scarf.

You raise your eyebrows. “Do you care?” Before he can answer, you lie on your seating block on your stomach, exposing the full mess of circuitry that you managed to painstakingly draw the last time a manic episode hit you. “Here. Do it better. Thymmetrical, red on the right.”

“You are ten kinds a’ fuckin’ insane, Captor,” he says, and settles into straddling you. “Should I get a fuckin’ ruler for Your Grace?”

You gasp a little each time the pen touches your skin, too quiet for anyone to hear. You’ve thought about just getting the schematics tattooed on instead of redrawing them over and over, but the thought of getting the lines crooked makes that an impossibility. Eridan is firm with the pens, and you can tell that he’s drawing with a steady hand.

It’s a disappointment when he caps the red pen with a click that’s deafening in the silent space you had built for yourself. “If you’re goin’ to be wastin’ yourself on a Helmsman commission,” he says, and you can hear him sneering, “you’re goin’ to damn well be in my ship.”

You made your peace with your fate a long time ago. Intellectually, you know that it’s likely Feferi - untested, tiny, young - will lose to Condesce, and you’ll all lose alongside her. This, though, is a two-middle-fingers-and-a-fuck-you to that. You know the worst that can happen. It doesn’t scare you.

“Really?” you ask. And because nothing could fail you now, you roll off the couch and press Eridan against the floor. “Give me a reason why,” you say, and it echoes out to the world. All you needed was one good reason, and now you’ve got it. No matter what happens, AA is going to be fine.

Eridan bites you, and you don’t think you’ll mind going out with a bang.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning! There is smut in this chapter! The fic rating has been changed accordingly. Enjoy???

You don’t sleep much when you’re manic. Past experience has taught you that you’ll regret this when you crash, but until then you’re going to stay at your computer, doing... well, doing nothing in particular. KK’s not online, which means he’s sleeping for once. Sometimes Feferi’s online, since when she’s at the bottom of the ocean daylight doesn’t mean a lot, but you don’t particularly want to talk to her now.

You open your latest ~ATH project and stare at it. If you’re being perfectly honest with yourself, it’s a snarled mess and you have no idea what it will do. Trying to focus and separate the code enough to understand it just gives you a headache.

There’s dirt on your screen. You rub it off, then notice that your nails are uneven. By the time you’ve dealt with that, you’ve forgotten what parenthetical you were up to pulling out in the ~ATH file. You close it, tap your fingers on your desk, then open it again. You just need to push past this block, then you’ll be able to get some real shit done.

It takes ten minutes of staring blankly at the editor before you connect hands to keyboard and start working. Once you manage to get past that intial this-page-is-almost-blank block, though, you barely notice the time flow by.

You leave the password-cracker open just in case it gets lucky as you write what is quickly becoming an elegant Trojan hoofbeast. Your latest plan is to engineer a path through the lower eschelons up through to someone who has access to the Vigenere key. And if that’s encrypted, you may as well talk a long walk off a short pier.

It’s probably encrypted.

Nonetheless, you carefully embed the Trojan into the latest season of In Which Two Yellow-Blooded Scientists and a Team Consisting of One Teal-Blood, One Brown-Blood, and One Blue Blood, Explore the Legitimacy of Local Myths and Superstitions Concerning Everyday Activities. That done, you throw your handywork into a decentralised file sharing system and watch as other people pick it up. The show is popular enough that it should make its way onto the hard drive of someone in the Imperial network soon enough, and then you can six-degrees-of-separation and social engineer your way through the ranks with the information the Trojan will collect.

As you lean back, Eridan storms into the room, still covered in red and blue slime. It’s a good look on him. Before you can ask why he’s up at this time of day, he grabs the mouse out from under your hand and mutes your sound.

“The fuck?” you say. It seems appropriate.

“Your Trollian has been goin’ off for half a fuckin’ hour,” he snaps. “The saner among us go offline when we don’t want to be bothered, Sol!”

“The thmarter amongtht uth complain before half an hour hath pathed,” you say, and grab his wrists to get his attention off your screen and onto you, where it belongs. He’s slimy and slick thanks to stealing your recuperacoon, and he could easily break free if he wanted to.

“Would you attend to business?” he gripes, instead. “Now I’m goin’ to go stark ravin’ mad knowin’ that there are unanswered messages an’ the window will be flashin’ forever.”

You frown and look back at your screen. “Who’th even methaging me at thith time of day?”

“It’s _night_ , Sol,” Eridan says, and tugs his wrists away. “A frankly uncivilised hour, but still night.”

You swivel your chair back until you’re facing him again. He’s so obviously uncomfortable in your hive, it’s ridiculous. He probably took the opportunity to bitch at you as an excuse to slop around and make you tell him where the ablutions block and laundry are, rather than just asking like a normal troll.

“Go take ablutionth and quit thlopping over my floor,” you finally say, and turn back to your computer. It looks like Terezi is messaging you, which is unusual but not worryingly so. “Then thee if you can talk thome thenthe into KK.”

Eridan’s out of your line of sight, but you can just _hear_ him shifting his stance and folding his arms. “An’ what if I’m not inclined to follow along with your orders?” he asks, tone frosty. _Highbloods_.

You rake him with psionics, and not gently. You send them down his spine and make him gasp, hook forward to the bundle of nerves buried deep in his nook and flare up. He moans, unable to stop himself, and you feel your pulse quicken despite your feigned indifference. You press deeper and release before it can do any good for either him or you.

“Go take ablutionth, ED,” you say, and open up Terezi’s window.

“I am goin’,” Eridan announces, “to take a shower, because your ‘cupe soper is fuckin’ despicable.”

You flip him off as you scan Terezi’s messages.

  
\-- gallowsCalibrator [GC] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   
GC: SOLLUX W3 N33D TO T4LK   
GC: UUUUGH 4PPL3B3RRY TURN YOUR COMPUT3R OFF 1F YOUR3 NOT TH3R3!   
GC: 4CTU4LLY YOUR3 NOT 1DL1NG OUT SO   
GC: SOLLUX   
GC: SOLLUX PL34S3 T4LK TO M3   
GC: PR3TTY PR3TTY PL34SE W1TH K4RK4T ON TOP   
GC: DO YOU KNOW HOW F4NT4ST1C YOUR R3J3CT1ON T4ST3S?   
GC: 1T T4ST3S L1K3 F3RM3NT3D 4PPL3S   
GC:  4ND R3J3CT1ON   
GC: WOW S33 1F 1 3V3R HOOK YOU UP W1TH FL33T SUPPL13S 4G41N   
GC: SOLLUX 1 W1LL G3T K4RK4T TO Y3LL 4T YOU   
GC: H3 3NJOYS 1T!   
GC: 1T SH4LL B3 TH3 MOST B4L4NC3D OF W1N-W1N S1TU4T1ONS.   
GC: 1 W1LL R3PORT YOU FOR CULL1NG DU3 TO 4 S4D L4CK OF 4B1L1TY TO M41NT41N 1NT3RP3RSON4L CONN3CT1ONS   
GC: TH3Y CULL FOR TH4T NOW   
GC: OK4Y 1 4M STRONGLY B3G1NN1NG TO SUSP3CT TH4T YOUR3 NOT R3PLY1NG TO M3 B3C4US3 YOUR3 J3RK1NG 1T   
GC: JUST GO H4NDSFR33 FOR ON3 MOM3NT 4ND 4CKNOWL3DG3 TH4T YOU 4R3 R3C31V1NG TH3S3   
GC: OK TH4T 1S 1T 1 4M T3LL1NG 3V3RYBODY 1 KNOW TH4T YOU D13D OF BULGEROT   
GC: K4RK4T W1LL CRY 4ND S4Y TH4T H3 TOLD YOU NOT TO GO N34R S34DW3LL3RS   
GC: OH H3 TOLD US 4LL 4BOUT 3R1D4N BTW   
GC: HOT >:]   
GC: T4K3 P1CTUR3S OF H1S G1LLS   
GC: 1 W4NT TO L1CK TH3M 4ND QU33N R4SPB3RRY BL4CKCURR4NT WONT L3T M3 N34R H3RS   
GC: 1 KNOW 1 C4N COUNT ON YOU   
TA: tz   
TA: whatever you’re driinkiing   
TA: 2top   
GC: 1 4M 4S SOB3R 4S 4 JUDG3   
GC: MOR3 1MPORT4NTLY WH3R3 H4V3 YOU B33N   
TA: tryiing two 2ave kk a2 per u2ual   
TA: ii thiink thii2 ha2 a good chance   
GC: LOOK 1 FOUND SOM3 L3G4L PR3C3D3NTS   
GC: OTH3R MUT4NTS H4V3 B33N 4LLOW3D TO L1V3 1F TH3Y’R3 US3FUL 3NOUGH TO TH3 3MP1R3   
GC: GR4NT3D NON3 OF TH3M H4V3 B33N OFF-SP3CTRUM BUT 1 TH1NK 1 C4N CR34T3 4N 4RGUM3NT ON 1T   
TA: tz we talked about thii2   
TA: we deciided there wa2 no hope of a legal loophole 2iince he won’t be allowed two contriibute two the 2lurry, and anybody who doe2n’t contriibute get2 culled a2ap   
GC: 1 COULD T4K3 1T THROUGH TH3 4PP34LS PROC3SS   
TA: tz   
GC: F1N3!    
GC: 1M DO1NG MY B3ST BUT TH3R3S JUST NOTH1NG TH3R3   
TA: ii know. iit’2 fiine.   
TA: look you liive near kk riight   
GC: K1ND OF   
GC: 1 DONT R34LLY L1V3 N34R 4NYBODY   
TA: can you get acce22 two legal record2 iin hii2 dii2triict though   
GC: NO   
GC: OF COURS3 1 C4NT   
GC: 1M JUST 4 L3G1SL4C3R4TOR 1N TR41N1NG   
GC: DUUUUUR SOLLUX   
TA: oh 2hut up    
TA: ii forgot you were paranoiid enough two do pre-a2cen2iion 2hiit   
TA: ii wa2 thiinkiing of gettiing hiim a reblood iident but ii need two know who ii2n’t goiing two be mii22iing iit   
GC: 4ND WH4T H4PP3NS TO H1M 4FT3R TH3Y D1SCOV3R TH3 RUS3   
GC: 4 STOL3N 1D3NT WONT L4ST LONG   
TA: ii don’t know eiither ok   
TA: ii don’t know how ii got to be iin charge of thii2 dumba22 plan but ii’m runniing bliind ju2t liike everyone el2e   
GC: >:[   
TA: not even 2orry   
GC: BUCK3TSLUSH >:]   
TA: wow diid you get that one out of one of your textbook2    
TA: 2iick burn tz   
GC: YOU N33D TO T4LK TO VR1SK4   
TA: waiit   
TA: what   
TA: ii wa2n’t expectiing that   
TA: you’d better have a good rea2on for 2ugge2tiing that   
GC: NO 1 JUST THOUGHT YOU KNOW WHO H4S SOLLUX NOT S33N 1N 4 WH1L3   
GC: OH OF COURS3   
GC: VR1SK4   
GC: L3TS S3T TH3M UP!   
GC: 1F 4NYON3 1S 4N 3XP3RT 1N 3V4D1NG TH3 L4W 1T 1S VR1SK4 S3RK3T   
GC: B3 C4R3FUL NOT TO G1V3 H3R 4N 1NCH BUT SH3 M1GHT B3 4BL3 TO G1V3 YOU 1NFORM4T1ON ON HOW TO 3V4D3 TH3 FL33T TH4T YOU C4N P4SS ON TO K4RK4T   
GC: 4ND SH3 SHOULD F33L L1K3 YOU TWO H4V3 UNF1N1SH3D BUS1N3SS!   
TA: ii hate you   
TA: ii hate you and ii hate that you’re riight   
TA: god fuckiing damn iit   
TA: ii’m goiing two 2top thiinkiing and go fuck my boyfriiend iin the 2hower   
GC: K1NKY   
GC: YOU ST1LL H4V3 VR1SK4’S H4NDL3?   
TA: yeah   
TA: bye tz   
\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has ceased trolling gallowsCalibrator [GC] --   
GC: BY3 SOLLUX   
GC: GOOD LUCK   


You push away from your desk harder than you mean to, sending the carefully-balanced drifts of deskjunk clattering to the floor. You don’t even care, you ceased to care the instant you saw the word ‘Vriska.’

Vriska is the reason so many people in your social circle need prosthetic limbs. Terezi somehow managed to remain cordial with her, after everything, but even they are no longer thicker than thieves.  You should hate her for what she did, turning you against AA as a weapon, but in reality it was just a taste of how much life sucks and will continue to suck for you.

Nonetheless, you’re glad you’ve spared AA that. Vriska is perhaps scared of you because you’re half-uncontrollable, and you took enough revenge during the whole FLARPing debacle to make her remember it. As far as you’re concerned, the two of you are even.

You don’t want to tip the scales again, in either direction. Vriska and debts are a bad combination.

You peel off your shirt on the way to the ablutions block, elbowing open the door as you unbutton your jeans. Eridan Ampora, intrepid explorer and FLARP veteran, did manage to find the block in your sorry excuse for a hivestem. You only have an ablutions stall, not a trap, and he doesn’t hear you over the sound of running water.

Your clothes get tossed on top of his, destined to be laundry, or quite possibly the next outfit to pass the sniff test once you can’t bring yourself to be fully functional. You pull aside the curtain and shove him against the wall as you climb in, more with psionics than the body mass you don’t have.

Eridan snarls and shoves back with his shoulders and chest, pressing up against you with all the flex you allow him. “Kept me waitin’ long enough,” he says.

You kiss him to shut him up, digging your hands into his hair to keep him where you want him as you shove a thigh between his and press up. He keens into your mouth, then breaks away to wail when you crack psionics over his gills. His bulge tries to coil around yours, twining through where it forks.

You pick him up and pin him against the wall more firmly, biting sharp little marks into his neck below his fins. The water’s hitting your shoulders and bouncing into his eyes, from the way he’s scrunching them closed, but you couldn’t care less at this point.

“You waiting for an invitation?” Eridan asks, and even with his breath coming in ragged gasps he manages to sound condescending. “Because if you ai-”

You press into him and let out a groan of your own. He’s so cool compared to you and you feel him leeching away your heat as you push as deep as you can get. “Jutht shut up,” you manage to gasp out. “I don’t care, I don’t want to know, jutht _shut up_.” You start rocking back and forth, twisting your bulge against the ridges in his nook as best you can, although between psionics and remembering to breathe your control is shot right now.

He presses his lips to one of your lower horns and tongues at it sloppily, and the cold sensation almost does you in. You pull him in by his gills and he wails again, his nook clenching around you, and then you reach one hand down and wrap your fingers around his bulge and start stroking it just on the borderline of too rough.

He curls forward around you and violet genetic material spills over your hand and down your legs. It takes you a moment longer to come, nook empty and aching, and your genetic material mixes to a strange shade of brown as it washes away.

“Fuck,” Eridan says, weakly. “We should’a used a bucket.”

You ease him down and rinse yourself off, exhaustion crashing down on you. You’ve been awake for the better part of two nights, and while you can usually handle it, pailing Eridan Ampora in your tiny excuse for an ablutions stall isn’t amongst your usual activities.

“Sol?” he says.

“Bucket, check,” you say, and step out of the stall to grab your only towel. “Tell me about Vrithka.”

Eridan freezes under the spray of water, his fins flaring out. “Vris? My Vris?”

“No, the other Vrithka we know.” You scrub your hair dry and toss the towel back over the rack. “I need to talk to her.”

\--

Eridan has to dress in some old, stretched-out clothes of yours. He hates every single minute of it, constantly picking at the material like it offends him personally. You relate what Terezi said to him, and he scowls the whole time.

“Well, she could be useful,” he allows. “You ain’t exactly got reason to go to her, though.” He politely doesn’t mention how you almost tore her limb from limb after she tried to use you to kill AA.

“If she can help KK...” you say, and sigh. “You going to her would be a dithathter, wouldn’t it?”

He shrugs uncomfortably. “She had to kill her lusus once I stopped FLARPin’ with her regularly. I don’t think she’d do me any favours.” He hesitates before saying, “If I can help Kar...”

You give him the shallowest of nods before burying your face in your hands. “Do you have any ideas about FF?” you ask, once you let yourself emerge.

Eridan’s lips tighten and for a moment you’re jealous of Feferi, for being able to incite that expression without even being here. “She’s talkin’ to me, but she ain’t exactly listenin’. I know she’s trainin’ more since you told her about psionic engines.”

You fix him with a level stare, made all the more impassive by your lack of pupils. “FF’s going to make thingth worthe for highbloodth. I’m doing this to thave KK and AA. What’th your reathon?”

“I want an Empire that actually works,” Eridan says. “An’ maybe some a’ your friends are my friends too, did you think a’ that?”

“And you don’t want FF to die on Ascension,” you say.

Eridan stiffens before leaning over the table to snarl at you. “Captor, if you could fuckin’ glub to the Emissary of the Horrorterrors, I’d stick a fuckin’ crown on you an’ call you Empress right now. I ain’t as hung up on Fef as everyone seems to think I am an’ if you fuckers would quit holdin’ it over my head that would be _perfect_ , thanks for askin’!”

You wait until he sits back down. “The tiara wouldn’t fit over my hornth,” you say, once he does.

He leans forward until his head hits the table. “This is the most amazin’ly terrible revolution I’ve ever goddamn heard of.”

\--

  
\-- arachnidsGrip [AG] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   
AG: Soooooooo!   
AG: Terezi told me that you need a favour, and she seemed to think that I’m the one to give it.   
AG: I’m pretty 8usy at the moment, so I can’t promise anything, 8ut I might 8e a8le to see a8out shifting around the irons in the fire.   
TA: hey vk   
TA: remember that tiime ii burned your eye out   
TA: me two   
TA: good tiime2   
AG: ::::| Well there’s no need to 8e hostile!   
AG: W8ter under the 8ridge, Sol!   
AG: 8esides, I got a new one. A 8etter one.   
AG: Really I should 8e thanking you!   
AG: So what do you need that requires my expertise?   
AG: If it’s a kismesis upgr8de I might 8e a8le to swing 8y :::;)   
TA: oh god no   
TA: tz told me you could get hold of a redblood iident that could pa22 iimperiial mu2ter   
AG: And who could you want that for, I wonder........   
TA: my way2 are my2teriiou2 and un2crutable   
TA: can you do iit or not   
AG: Suuuuuuuure, I can cut you a 8r8k! Least I can do for an old friend.   
AG: The a8ility to fool the drones is gonna cost you though. And it might take a while.   
TA: co2t me what exactly   
TA: and how long   
AG: Weeeeeeeell... let’s see...   
AG: Why don’t we see what I can get my hands on and talk a8out payment once I know I can get it?   
AG: Don’t worry, you get m8’s r8s.   
TA: that make2 me more worriied   
TA: how long vk   
AG: I’ll upd8 you in a week or so! Don’t get your panties in a twist, g8d.   
AG: I am cutting you a huge 8r8k with this, you know.   
TA: yeah you 2aiid   
TA: let me know   
AG: Shall do :::;)   
\-- arachnidsGrip [AG] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   



	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! There are graphic depictions of surgery in this chapter. If you're easily squicked by body-horror-esque things, this may not be the fic for you.

\-- apocalypseArisen [AA] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --  
AA: sollux go to sleep  
TA: eveniing aa  
TA: how’ve you been  
TA: ii’ve been great thank2 for a2kiing  
AA: terezi already told me youve been up all day!  
AA: this is what happens when i leave you alone  
AA: have you even slept since the flarp thing  
TA: breakfa2t?  
AA: youre buying 0u0  
\-- apocalypseArisen [AA] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --  
TA: god  
TA: dammiit

Eridan left as soon as his shirt was dry, because wearing a lowblood symbol is anathema to idiots and he couldn’t leave wearing yours. This means you’ve been kicking around your place since, with nothing but your thoughts since KK’s still not talking to you. You’ll have to sort that out, you guess. You’ve managed to keep yourself together enough to clear out the depression detritus that’s built up around your desk, but meeting up with AA and having someone else remind you to keep focus sounds nice.

You drop out the window like you normally do. There aren’t any other all-purpose psi users in your hivestem to fly up and take your shit, and if there were a swarm of bees to the face tends to discourage attempts to do so. You and AA have a spot where you always meet, so much so that you never even have to discuss it anymore. It’s a terrible place that you still don’t actually know the name of that has unlimited refills of their terrible coffee (for you) and actually offers tea (for AA). Plus they do a mean oinkbeast slab and grubsauce on fried bread.

Between there and your apartment, you can account for 99% of your life.

AA is already there by the time you touch down, waiting for you on a bench with her legs tucked up underneath her. Her hair is almost to the length it was before she had to cut it once you’d burned half of it off. Her smile, when she waves to you, is as heartbreaking as it ever was. Her arm glints in the light spilling out of the building and you want to cut down everyone who looks at her.

The metal arm is your fault. So are the rebuilt sections of her torso and her legs. The only reason you’re not at fault for her being ashes on the wind is because halfway through trying to get revenge, Vriska Serket lost you. After that all you remember is Eridan towing the two of you down to Feferi as you held the respirator over AA’s face, and then the strange shifting light of Feferi’s hive playing over you until Equius appeared and you had to help him.

Your fingerprints are all over AA, inside and out, and you have a special kind of loathing for yourself because of it.

She accepts your hand to help her up and dusts off her skirt before cheerfully announcing, “I’m going to eat everything this place has.”

You twine your fingers through hers, one-two-one-two, and take reassurance in the warmth of her skin. Her hand is callused from untold hours of digging and strong down to the bones, unlike your resemblance to a twig. There has never been a moment of your life that you haven’t pitied Aradia Megido, and the both of you would have self-destructed in amazing ways without each other. She keeps you from wasting away and you keep her from digging herself neck-deep in problems. 

You hope someone will keep her safe, once everything goes down. You probably won’t be around to do it.

Your appetite hits halfway through the first plate and you wind up demolishing six plates of oinkbeast slab, egg, and griddle cakes. By the time you’re done you’re reasonably sure the calories will last you a while. AA has two plates and steals bits off yours until you’re done.

“So I got some interesting files from Feferi yesterday,” she says, and sips her tea.

You freeze. Anyone else and you could have played it off, but AA knows you.

“And then she said that she wanted me to draft changes to the Helmsman program to make it more...” She purses her lips in thought and taps her fingers against them. “Compassionate.”

You scoot back in your chair.

“Sollux,” she says, and holds out her hands. When you don’t say anything, she wriggles her fingers until you place your hands in hers. “Do you really think Feferi can do it?”

You can’t say anything past the block in your throat. Finally, shamefully, you manage to shrug.

Aradia sighs and presses one of your hands to her cheek, closing her eyes. She gets about as much sleep as you do, with the ghosts that haunt her, and all of a sudden it shows. Your combined hands push away the hair covering the scarring over her neck and cheek, smooth shiny patches of skin where she needed grafts making her look exactly like someone who had tangled with Vriska Serket.

“I think that you should probably fill me in,” she says. 

AA has always known exactly how to break you down. There’s no point in being stubborn to her. “Not here,” you say, because paranoia has always served you well.

You pay for breakfast as promised and pull AA into the sky with you. You can just feel the onlookers thinking helmsman bait at you. By the time psionics appropriate for helming reach your age, they learn to keep their powers as a last defense. You and AA have always been exceptions to the rule.

In the air, away from sellouts and cameras and microphones, you tell her about the bargain you and Eridan have struck, to get Feferi on the throne no matter what. The explanation that falls out of you is jumbled and erratic, but AA understands.

She reclines in the sky as if she was born there and frowns. “I don’t see how helping Karkat comes into it. If you’re getting Feferi on the throne, she’ll stop him from being culled.”

“But if she doethn’t, then KK’th dead meat waiting to happen.” You wrap your arms around yourself. It’s chilly up here. “With hith luck, he’d probably get put on the thienthe donor litht.”

Aradia twirls around until her stomach is against your back, and wraps her arms around you loosely. “So either you think Feferi’s going to fail and Karkat needs saving, or  you think that Feferi’s going to win and I’ll be safe.”

“It’th contingenthieth,” you argue. “KK needth them a hell of a lot more than you do.”

“I worry about you,” she says, and it sounds slightly tinged with guilt. You both know that you’re the pacifying partner of this moirallegiance,  but  you think that sometimes AA wishes it was the other way around. You can’t deny that you’re a hot mess. She rests her hands over your stomach and her hair drifts over you like a thousand fine wires. You imagine being linked to AA like you’ll be linked to a ship one day and shiver. “You can’t focus on both of those things all the time, Sollux! When was the last time you slept?”

“A while ago,” you admit. “But I wouldn’t have thlept anyway.”

She presses her lips to your cheek. “And that’s why I worry, you idiot.” The two of you are silent for a long time, and you listen to the rhythm of her breath, the hum and whir of her artificial organs. “You know that you can’t do everything, right?”

You stay silent. 

“I think that you should let Karkat do his own thing.”

You twist to look up at her. You know she and Karkat don’t mind each other’s hold on you, that AA knows that Karkat will always be your best friend and that Karkat knows that you and AA are two parts of the same soul and she’s everything that isn’t gloriously fucked up in you. There’s no reason that AA would want Karkat dead.

“Which isn’t to say that you should let him be dumb,” she continues, like she’s reading your mind. “It sounds like he’s being pretty cagey about his plans, but he does have them if that’s the case. And Karkat Vantas has never been stupid.”

You close your eyes and sink back against Aradia. She curls your shirt through her fingers and lets you think. You can’t let Karkat run into things completely blind. You’ll get him the ident so he can move around as he needs, and then...

You’ll have faith, you guess. That’s not easy for you, but you’ll have to manage somehow. Maybe you can somehow tie the two causes together, the way you have with Aradia and Feferi.

“While you’re deliberating,” Aradia says as she digs her fingers into the spot that makes you shriek like a grub and flail, “the rest of us have needs too. Are you doing anything today?”

“Wow, AA, I can’t believe you’re even athking-” you slap her hand away when she tries to tickle you again “-you know how packed my calendar ith, I could barely thqueethe you i- okay, merthy! I want to talk to KK later but that’th it.”

“Then you and Equius can give me a checkup!” she says, and stabs you in the ribs one last time. “I think I need oiling.”

“They don’t call you ruthtblood for nothing,” you say.

Aradia doubles over laughing. You try to imprint the memory on your brain, tuck it away in secret recesses where nobody will be able to take precious things from you. The sound of her laugh, the feel of her skin against your lips when you kiss her forehead, the way the laughter dances in her eyes long after the sound is gone.

You’ll burn yourself out before you forget one moment of the time you’ve spent with AA. Simple as that.

\--

Equius’ hive is almost as big as your entire hivestem. It sits on a cliff that is, and always has been, about to collapse. A ravine separates him from Vriska, and in your opinion it’s not nearly far enough. Only shades of blue make the hives particularly distinctive. Bluebloods will stick a spire anywhere it can fit, and as a result you have trouble telling the hives apart.

The ravine looks empty without Vriska’s lusus and its horrifying webs. That’s another change you don’t mind.

Aradia is the one who knocks on Equius’ door. You stand there, your shoulders hunched in, generally appearing as awkward as possible. You’ve been here a grand total of twice for AA’s sake, and all in all you prefer the comfort of your cramped hivestem and the messy sprawl of silicomb hives and all your wires as a tripping hazard for normal trolls.

Aurthour opens the door. Aradia, who has been here more than you, scratches him under the chin as you walk in. He whuffs quietly in appreciation before leading you downstairs to one of Equius’ labs. Nepeta fails to either attach herself to your scalp or talk to AA about skeletons, so you guess she’s probably out hunting.

You arrive just in time to see Equius spectacularly punch the head off a robot in a cage match. You applaud and Aradia whistles through her fingers, which is probably not the most diplomatic way you could have announced your presence. You see Equius’ brows raise over the cracked lenses of his sunglasses, the moment when he realises a couple of lowbloods are in his inner sanctum, and his resignation to the fact a moment later.

As careful as he always is when he’s not fighting robots to the death, he picks up a bottle of water and a towel, mopping his face before unlocking the cage and stepping out. Aurthour starts picking his way through the lab, collecting used glasses and old plates from any horizontal surface they’ve been left on. You respect a man who has mastered the art of I’m-busy-working-dish-stacking-fu, and Equius is clearly your brethren in arms.

“I wasn’t expecting you,” he says, stiffly, once he’s in conversation range.

Aradia gives him an overly sweet smile and swings into the medical chair in the middle of the lab. “I need a checkup,” she says. It’s easy enough to get past Equius’ casteism if you just charge through and make him follow you, and so that’s what she does. “Something sounds off in my chest.”

Equius’ face settles into its usual stoniness. “I would have preferred you called ahead. This could take a significant amount of time.”

In the background, you wash your hands and snap on a pair of gloves. Equius’ sterilised tools are kept in the steriliser, since he doesn’t have much use for them unless he’s fixing someone up. There’s a tray in there too, so you pile everything he’ll need on the tray and rest it on the swinging arm of AA’s chair. You find the anaesthetic machine under a workbench after toeing open a couple of cupboards and hip-check it over so you won’t have to change your gloves.

“Captor-” Equius says, having given up on AA as a lost cause. It probably has something to do with how she’s taken her shirt off.

“If you think you’re leaving AA with thomething rattling around inthide her, you should probably keep thinking until you reach a different conclusion,” you say, and dig around until you find some plastic-wrapped one time use syringes and a cannula.

“I don’t take orders from you,” he says, his hands tightening into fists.

You lay down the syringe and look at him over the rim of your glasses. “Jutht a thuggethtion.”

Equius growls and stomps over to the sink to wash up. “Your mouth will be the death of you, Captor.”

“That’th what they tell me,” you say, and take the time to lean over Aradia while he’s occupied. “You okay with thith? We’re going to have to knock you out, the recovery time’ll be-”

Aradia reaches up and cups your face with her metal hand. “Better sooner than later. I’ll be fine as long as you’re here.”

“Yeah,” you say, and kiss her forehead before inserting the cannula into a vein near the soft inside of her elbow. The syringe gets filled with propofol and you carefully inject it into the cannula and push the plunger down. Before you can reach for it yourself, Equius hands you a mask already hooked up to the anaesthetic machine. You glance at the dosages before sealing it around Aradia’s nose and mouth.

“Breathe through your nothe, count back from ten,” you say. She rolls her eyes at you - been here, done this - before closing her eyes.

She’s out by seven.

Now that everything is surgical, Equius isn’t tossing hissy fits over how lewd AA’s being. Her torso is half skin and half metal, joined by a livid pink scar that knits together with the layer of bioengineered flesh you had to make to join the halves without everything going to hell. Equius picks up a screwdriver and begins removing the plating over her organ shield. This is his territory, so you step back and keep an eye on the anaesthetic machine.

You know Equius wonders how you picked this all up. You were clumsy and slow the first time you worked with him, when you were building AA back from the ground up, but she would have died without the both of you and your abilities. Equius is good with prosthetics, like Vriska’s arm, but keeping someone alive was beyond his skillset. And that’s where you came in, with your scholarly knowledge of biotech and how to turn yourself into a living computer. It wasn’t so hard to apply to AA, once you and Eq had managed to work together and you’d figured out how to route the nerve redirection to a new hand instead of a ship.

You’d probably make a really good mediculling assistant by now.

With the plating removed, you can see the framework of metal bones and the bioflesh that comprises half of AA’s chest. Equius carefully slices into the flesh and peels it away from the metal before removing two of the ribpieces of her frame.

“Light,” he says, hands full with wires as he tries to look inside her chest cavity.

You pull the overhead light down closer, then pick up a small torch and shine it towards the gap in AA. You should probably feel disturbed about her being cut open, but this is just the way things are for the two of you.

Equius shifts his grip on the wires and takes the torch from you. “Test her nerves.”

You resist stepping on his toes and close your eyes instead, sending the smallest trickle of psi through her that you can. You map out all the fake nerves that you grew for her, testing for weaknesses or breaks. There are none, which is a fairly relieving result. It means you won’t have to tear out half her nervous system until you can regrow it.

“Not the problem,” you report.

“Hm.” Equius carefully disconnects some of the wiring - mostly power, some distributing motor function from the chips that you flashed with bootleg helmsman firmware so she’d be able to actually move her limbs - and lays it over the flesh side of her chest. “There is something that I do not understand about you.”

You bite back a groan. “Shoot.”

“I can understand why you would expend this effort for Megido.” He frowns in concentration as he carefully eases his hand past Aradia’s lung. “For one of you, she is remarkable. If I did not know better, I would have expected her a blueblood.”

“We all know about your creepy fetish, yeah,” you say, which is probably not the best thing to say to someone who has to punch robots to death to keep himself under control while his moirail’s not around. “Thorry.”

“If you are referring to Megido, I must admit that my... interest in her waned long ago.” He carefully draws out a loop of plastic filled with red. This is the part where you actually do get a little nauseated. You’ve seen enough of AA’s blood for a lifetime. “If you refer to the haemospectrum, I believe we’ve debated that enough.”

“Ith that flowing properly?” you ask in a vain attempt to derail the conversation. This is why you only come with AA when she needs something major done.

“It appears to have lost volume.” Equius watches the tube. “Nonetheless, you appear to be throwing yourself down a path of self-destruction.”

“You’re not actually athking anything,” you snap, on the defensive. To cover it up - you have nothing to defend - you begin arranging the items you’ll need for patching AA up once Equius finds the fault on the tray.

“The schematics show above your collar,” Equius says. “I wasn’t aware I was pointing out something sensitive.”

Your neck itches with the need to pull your collar up and hide the lines Eridan drew on you, but you can’t without getting biotech gunk all over your shirt and probably giving AA an infection. Equius’ lab is somewhat sterile and antibiotics do wonders, but in the end this is a shitty black-market patch job and you don’t want to make it riskier than it has to be.

Equius follows the tube with his fingertips and draws back, his lips pursed. There’s blood on the fingers of his glove. “The seal must have failed. There should be some in the drawer below the syringes.”

You find a new seal and hand it over, then change your gloves and lower the amount of anaesthetic in the gas Aradia’s breathing in. Once the seal is swapped out there shouldn’t be much else, and you’d like Aradia awake sooner rather than later.

“What I don’t understand is you attempting to throw yourself away while your moirail needs you to live.” He clamps the tube shut and unscrews the connection, replaces the seal, and screws it back together. You shine the abandoned torch on the connection and the both of you watch for a long moment. No blood flows out.

“She won’t need me potht-Athension, when FF taketh over.” You suction out the blood and let Equius scrub the dried blood off her chassis before suctioning that out too. Antibiotic spray on the parts that contact bioflesh is next, and then you carefully reseat the wiring Equius removed. “I don’t think it’th throwing mythelf away to prepare for the future.”

Equius reattached the metal ribs he removed, then comes riveting back into place the bioflesh that knits with her and her framework. You coat that in antibiotic gel before stepping back to let Equius reattach the protective plating. “You would not necessarily have to be a Helmsman,” he says, screwing down the plates with the ease of practice.

You turn away and turn the anaesthetic off completely. “You don’t know shit.”

“Do not use that language in my house.”

You don’t say anything else. When you hear him move away to scrub up, you strip your gloves off and take a seat next to AA, holding her hand until she comes out of it.

\--

You fly Aradia back to her hive, because if she flew herself at this point she’d probably fall asleep halfway through and fall through someone’s roof. Which would be funny, except for the part where she’d get injured.

You pour her into her recuperacoon and she tells you to go home. Instead you walk around with a husktop and make sure that her security protocols are up to date. Then you check on her and make sure she’s still breathing. Then you leave after combing your fingers through her hair one last time.

Karkat has finally unblocked you by the time you make it to your hivestem. You send him a 2up and trawl through your nutrition block while you wait for a reply. There are some horrifically out of date biscuits at the back of your cupboard, and you dig them out along with some honey that isn’t mind honey. It’ll do.

\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has started trolling carcinoGeneticist [CG] --  
TA: 2up  
CG: ARE WE REALLY DOING THE LET’S PRETEND IT NEVER HAPPENED ONLY TO ARGUE ABOUT THE FACT THAT WE ARGUED ABOUT SOMETHING TWO HOURS LATER THING AGAIN.  
CG: BECAUSE I AM SO FUCKING SICK OF THAT THING. THAT THING MAY IN FACT BE TERMINAL. CONGRATULATIONS, SOLLUX, YOU HAVE GIVEN ME THING CANCER AND I ONLY HAVE TWO WEEKS TO LIVE.  
TA: don’t bu2t a valve kk  
TA: ii wa2 ju2t 2ayiing hii  
CG: HI.  
TA: 2o  
TA: aa kiicked my a22 and told me ii wa2 beiing unfaiir  
TA: 2o tell me your plan2 and ii wiill actually lii2ten  
CG: HA, HA, AND ALSO HA. WE BOTH KNOW THAT SOLLUX CAPTOR NEVER ACTUALLY LISTENS.  
TA: oh my god kk 2hut up  
TA: ii am legiitiimately tryiing two be helpful here  
CG: FINE. YOU WANT TO KNOW THE TRUTH? KARKAT DOESN’T HAVE A PLAN! KARKAT IS JUST AS CONFUSED AS THE REST OF YOU INSUFFERABLE BARFPUPPETS AND MANAGES TO HIDE IT BETTER WITH WAVING AROUND AND SHOUTING!  
CG: CONGRATULATIONS! YOU HAVE SEEN THROUGH MY CAREFULLY-CONSTRUCTED EXTERIOR TO THE DELICIOUS CANDY-RED MEAT BELOW. MOTHERFUCKING *SWOON*.  
TA: enliighteniing  
TA: thii2 ii2 me 2trokiing my eviil beard thoughtfully  
CG: IT’S CALLED A GOATEE, YOU IGNORANT SHITSTAIN.  
CG: I’M GOING TO INCITE A REBELLION. I’M NOT THE ONLY OFF-CASTE TROLL.  
TA: wow  
TA: iit’2 ok kk you can ju2t come riight out and 2ay iit  
TA: no need two cu2hiion iit for me  
CG: YOU’RE OLD ENOUGH TO KNOW WHAT A GOATEE IS BY NOW, CAPTOR.

You think back to the carefully blank look on Equius’ face, take a deep breath, and start to knit your life back together.

TA: 2o how do you feel about beiing a rebel wiith a cau2e  
CG: I HAVE A CAUSE. THAT’S KIND OF THE ENTIRE POINT. WHERE DID YOU MISPLACE YOUR THINKPAN TODAY?  
TA: no you have a vague iidea of 2omethiing two throw your2elf away on  
TA: we’re gettiing ff on the throne  
TA: iif you wanted two collect up a bunch of 2ympathii2er2 and tell them about how great liife would be wiithout culliing ii’m pretty 2ure iit would help her  
TA: and you know 2he’ll 2wear iit  
CG: I KNOW EXACTLY SHIT FUCKING ALL. FEFERI IS YOUR SQUEEZE, NOT MINE.  
CG: ...DO YOU THINK IT’D WORK?  
TA: hell ii thiink the empiire’2 goiing two iimplode on a2cen2iion niight  
TA: but we miight a2 well help iit happen  
TA: go talk two ff  
TA: ii’m goiing two 2leep  
\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has ceased trolling carcinoGeneticist [CG] --

You turn off the screen and your speakers and track your way over to your recuperacoon. You haven’t slept in days, and you black out almost as soon as you hit the slime.

Everything’s going to work out. It has to.

 


	5. Chapter 5

\-- cuttlefishCuller [CC] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --  
CC: Sollux, are you talking to me yet?  
TA: ii wa2nt not talkiing two you  
CC: O)(.  
CC: W)(ale, good! I needed to talk to you and I was going to w)(et)(er or knot you liked it!  
TA: ok  
TA: why have ii 2uddenly become the go-two guy for talkiing  
TA: ii thiink you want kk  
CC: You’re our leec)(pin!  
TA: ew  
CC: I’m relying on you, Sollux. You’ve given me Araydia and Karcrab but I don’t minnow w)(at to do wit)( t)(em.  
CC: I’m just an Empress-in-wading, knot a revolutionary mastermind!  
TA: and you thiink ii am?  
TA: ff ii want you on the throne 2o my friiend2 aren’t 2laughtered but ii don’t know anythiing about gettiing you there  
TA: talk two ed  
TA: he’2 the abhii2toriian  
CC: Fin, bring )(im along. We’re having a M-E--ETING, Solelux.  
TA: what  
TA: 2hiit no ff your hiive ii2 probably bugged a2 hell  
CC: T)(en we’ll use yours!  
TA: ff  
CC: Karcrab’s?  
TA: ii have thiing2 two do  
CC: Like w)(at? MOP---E and sit in your chair and pretend you’re already D-EAD?  
CC: Too bad! Your Empress needs you, Sollux Captor, and you’re knot getting awave so -EASILY.  
CC: If you want t)(is to work t)(en you’re just going to have to commit. S)(OR---EY.  
TA: wow ii’m flattered and all but ii already have a moiiraiil  
CC: I’m knot your moirail, I’m kicking your bass. Now get moving before I MAK----E you move!  
CC: Karcrab’s )(ive! Two )(ours!  
cuttlefishCuller has signed off!  
TA: ii’m 2o confu2ed riight now

\--

Karkat’s hive is somehow bigger than yours. You’re not actually sure how he got a hive at all, or a lusus, or a life for that matter. It’s one of those things that you just leave alone. Like how Terezi can hook you up with Fleet hardware, and how exactly Feferi was able to keep Aradia alive. Everyone has their secrets.

Eridan’s still bitching when you land, but even he shuts up when the door opens. Karkat stands there. Karkat, who when you last saw him was five-foot-nothing and as stuck in adolescent hell as you. Now he’s taller than you, just barely, and filled out on top of it. His eyes are rust-red - contacts, you guess, but it’s not the little shoots of colour that AA’s starting to get. The fucker must have gone through a moult and not even bothered to tell you.

“Kar?” Eridan squeaks, finally distracted from the fact that blood dried in his hair on the flight over. You don’t even know. You don’t think you want to know.

Karkat rolls his eyes. “No, I killed and ate him.”

“Oh my fuckin’ god,” Eridan marvels, and starts poking at Karkat’s face. “You bastard, did it hurt? An’ if your big secret is that you’ve been a rustblood all this time, I am goin’ to jam Ahab’s through your foot, I fuckin’ swear-”

You see the expression fade from KK’s face and leave blank dread behind. He might have moulted, but he’s still as easy to read as ever. Of course, Eridan has a chronic case of the stupid, and keeps prattling on until you seize his wrist and drag him through the door. You hope Feferi is already here. You’re going to shove Eridan in front of her and let him make his stupid comments to someone who isn’t afraid to hurt back.

Karkat grabs your shoulder as you pass. You take a deep breath through your nose and let Eridan go, even if you really want to see what happens when he runs into Feferi.

“Why did you bring him?” Karkat hisses at you, once Eridan’s around a corner and therefore presumably out of earshot. Karkat is _terrible_ at being secretive.

“FF’th orderth,” you say, and pull out your palmtop, tapping a quick message into it.

you realii2e youre goiing two have two tell hiim 2ometiime riight  
or diid you ju2t hope two throw a revolutiion wiithout hiim notiiciing

Karkat scowls at your palmtop ferociously enough that you’re surprised it doesn’t flee his grasp. “I don’t remember volunteering my hive for this,” he says, stabbing at the palmtop.

NO, YOU UTTER NOOKSTAIN, CLEARLY I WAS UNDER THE IMPRESSION THAT I COULD DO THINGS IN SECRET AND BE THE MASTERMIND IN THE SHADOW OF THE THRONE, FOREVER ENTANGLED IN STRANDS OF FEFERI’S HAIR.   
YOU HEARD HOW HE SAID RUSTBLOOD.   
WHAT IF HE DECIDES TO TAKE CARE OF MY PROBLEM THE QUICK AND MERCIFUL WAY? BEING CULLED IN MY OWN HOUSE WAS NOT ON THE AGENDA OF THE MEETING, LAST TIME I CHECKED. ALTHOUGH NOTHING WAS, SO MAYBE HE’S PENCILLED IT IN!

You grab the palmtop back before he gets particularly inspired.

youre beiing dumb   
he2 already 2aiid hed do anythiing he can two help and iit2 pretty obviiou2 youre not a ru2tblood   
iit2 not liike he2 been pathetiically 2appiing at your attentiion2 for liiteral 2weep2 or anythiing   
dumba22

Karkat scowls at the palmtop. Before he can inflict more capslock on it, Feferi leans out into the hall.

She’s changed, in the almost three sweeps since you’ve seen her. Her frame is still short and thick, heavy muscle under a layer of insulating fat. The way she stands is what’s different. She plants her feet on the ground like she owns it, shoulders back, head high. A circlet sits on her brow and thin gold chains loop her wrists, a visible sign of her royalty that doesn’t interfere with her culling fork. Her usual goggles hang from her neck, the only remnant of the Feferi you met three sweeps ago.

You swallow and think, _she didn’t cull Aradia_.

She walks around the two of you in flowing steps, her hair flicking out around her ankles with the motion. You are reminded of a shark circling and freeze in place, only to feel a sharp prod in the small of your back.

“Get moving!” she says, cheerfully.

“I’m being herded by our future empress,” Karkat says, and slaps your palmtop back into your hand.

“We’re a tetht market,” you say, and stagger forward a couple steps. “Firtht she tethtth on uth, then it thpreadth to the Empire.”

Feferi bonks you over the horns. “Onward!”

“I have some suggestions,” Karkat says, and gets a jab for his troubles. “All hail Feferi Peixes, Lady of the Jabby Stick.”

“Perfect,” Feferi says, and like usual you have no idea whether or not she’s joking.

\--

The meeting goes precisely as nowhere as you expected with you, a stuck-up idiot, a shouty jerk, the future Empress, and Aradia shoved together in a room. You’re practically climbing the walls after the first five minutes, forcing yourself to stay in your chair. Aradia steps on your foot under the table and pins you to the ground, and you’re more grateful than you want to admit.

You never actually thought you’d want to run from _Feferi_ , but that’s a good thing, right? She’s getting her Heiress on and striking fear into the hearts of the population.

“Thith ithn’t working,” you say, before you realise you’re opening your dumbass mouth. Everyone looks at you and you resist the urge to slide down in your chair until they stop. Then you realise that everything will, in fact, be ruined forever if you don’t speak up.

“Whale?” Feferi finally says, when your brain refuses to kick into gear.

For once, you stop and think before you speak. When you finally say something, you are confident in your words, which are, “Thethe planth are _shit_.”

“Oh, fuck _you_ ,” Eridan, who has been putting together plans from historical documentation of famous coups, alien takeovers, and attacks on the Condesce, says. “I’d like to see you plan somethin’ half as impressive, you ingrate and imbe-”

Feferi holds up a hand and Eridan stutters into silence. “What do you mean?” she asks, folding her hands back together on the table.

“Everything Eridan’th put together ith for war,” you say. “But you’re not aiming for war.”

Aradia tilts her head thoughtfully. “You aren’t, are you?” she asks Feferi. “It’s always going to be lowbloods who lose.”

“Of course not!” Feferi sits up straight, indignant. “I want things to be _better_ , not worse!”

“And if being better meant that you abdicated the throne,” Karkat says. “What then?”

Feferi sighs and slips off her circlet. “I want to keep Mom fed, and I want to keep my fronds safe, and if there’s anything left after that, I want to start evening society out.” She spins the circlet through her hands, not meeting any of your eyes. “I’m not as stupid as you think I am,” she says, and you’re not sure who she’s addressing. “I know that the only chance Alternia has of keeping together after Condesce’s death is me handling affairs. I’m going to be Empress for a good forty sweeps or more before any other form of ruling can be introduced.” The circlet bends in her hands without any apparent effort on her part. “I won’t be a puppet ruler, but I do want advisors I can trust.”

Aradia inclines her head. “I can accept that. I’ll be your advisor as long as you actively work towards making things better and making yourself obsolete.”

Feferi looks up again, and to your utter surprise her eyes are wet. She wipes them with the back of a hand and laughs, bitter and brittle. “Remember when we were friends?” She forces a smile and wipes away more tears, rolling her eyes up in an effort to stop more coming. “I miss when we were six and dumb, minnow?”

“Now we’re eight and magnificent idiots,” Karkat says. He taps his fingers on the table before saying, “You don’t need war, you need revolution.”

Eridan slams an old, leather-bound book in front of him with surprising vengeance. “Right, a fuckin’ revolution, a’ course! You know how many a’ those there have been, Kar?”

Karkat rolls his eyes. “How many, you disgusting fount of demotivational information?”

“Two,” Eridan bites. “One a’ them was stricken from all records, an’ the second was based in the first, an’ neither a’ them fuckin’ worked!” He opens the book, which falls open on the right page by magic, or at least the magic of constant use. “An’ _that_ one got all the fuckin’ adults exiled off-planet!” he says, stabbing a finger down on the page. Upside-down, you can make out the heading, _The Summoner’s Revolution_.

Karkat looks at the page before slamming the book shut. “If you want out, then go,” he says. “Personally, I can either do this or contemplate the quickest method of committing suicide, but I fully understand that you have more _choices_.”

Eridan takes off his glasses and pinches his nose. “Kar...”

“Don’t fucking _Kar_ me-”

“-I want this to work,” Eridan snaps, his fins flaring wide. “An’ so I am doin’ you the incredible service a’ telling you your plan a’ revolution is as fuckin’ stupid as your taste in romcoms, an’ I’ll thank you to take me at my word given my thorough fuckin’ familiarity with both.”

You take the opportunity the resulting silence gives you and waggle your eyebrows at Karkat. “I’ll share.”

Karkat slowly leans forward until his forehead thunks on the table (it’s a lot further than it used to be, you can’t help but notice). “Well, I’m going to be contemplating my slow and messy death. Best of luck, bucketlickers.”

Eridan pries Karkat up by the hair. “What you fuckin’ need isn’t one thing or the other. A coup’s for highbloods an’ a revolution’s for lowbloods.”

“So you’re saying we need both,” Feferi says.

“You need to win over the highbloods an’ convince them that life under you is goin’ to be better than Condesce’s reign,” Eridan says, and drops Karkat. “Kar, I hope you have a better plan for revolution than just shoutin’ at everyone, because it works on us but it ain’t gonna work for the wider population.”

Karkat sighs, picks himself up, and looks at you before shaking his head. “It may surprise you to learn, Ampora, that I am not actually a rustblood.”

“ _Wow_ ,” Eridan says, with a tart amount of shock and awe. “Really?”

“KK,” you say, uneasy.

Karkat stares at the ceiling and holds his eyelids open with one hand while pinching off the rust contacts with the other. “He had to find out sometime.” Both lenses removed, he blinks twice before beckoning Eridan closer.

It’s not necessary, you think. Even from where you are you can see the paths of bright cherry red in Karkat’s irises, already at least a quarter filled. Eridan leans in anyway, grabs Karkat’s chin with one hand and tilts so his eyes catch the light. Karkat schools his face blank, but you can still tell his mind is ticking away. He’s probably calculated at least three exit strategies by now.

“Shit,” Eridan breathes. “Yeah, you’re gonna start a revolution, alright.”

Aradia leans into you, breaking your focus from the tableau of Karkat and Eridan, and whispers, “Your palmtop’s been going off, dweeb.”

You love her, you swear.

\-- gallowsCalibrator [GC] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --  
GC: 1S TG1S 3NYON3 WHO 1SN;T F3MZ33  
TA: what.  
GC: 1 4M CONT1NU1NG ON TH3 3SSUMPT1ON TH4T YOU 4R3 NOT G4MZ44  
TA: tz  
TA: are you drunk   
GC: 1 3M DLGHTLY 1NC3P3C1T3T2D  
GC: K1NGLT T3LL SOLLIX TH3T 1 N33D SOM3ON3 4T MY PL4C3 PRONTO  
TA: 2ollix  
TA: 2eriiou2ly  
GC: 1F TH1A 1S AOLLUX QU1T M3K1NG FUN OF M3 4ND G3T OV2E H4R3  
GC: 1F TJ1S 1S VR1SK4 FUVK YOU FO 1T YOU OW2 ME  
TA: thii2 had better be 2eriiou2 tz  
GC: 1 W1LL B3 W41T1NG 1N 34G3E 4NT1V1P4T1ON.  
TA: tz?  
GC is an idle troll!

You drop your palmtop back into your pocket. “I gotta go,” you say to Aradia.

Eridan and Karkat look at you almost simultaneously, but Karkat is the first to speak. “Seriously? You are _seriously_ ditching important treasonous planning session the first to go bump bulges with whoever was texting you.”

“I’ll give TZ your regardth,” you say as you stand up, and laugh internally at the way he blanches. “I’ll come back after and you can fill me in.”

“Sole-lux!” Feferi says, as Aradia squeezes your hand in a silent goodbye.

“I’m done, your Imperial Majethty,” you say, and kick your chair back under the table. “AA and Karkat and Eridan are your advithorth, I’m jutht the computer guy.” You hesitate for a moment. “Well, fine, okay, I’m probably your intelligenthe thpecialitht or thomething, but you don’t need me right now and TZ doeth, tho.”

Feferi curls her fingers and you lean down until she can place her hands on your face. She pulls you in and kisses your forehead. “I value your input more than you know, Sollux,” she says with a sad smile as you pull away. “You were always conchest with me, when we were younger. Thank you for still being so.”

“Right,” you say, awkwardly trying to fill the silence that’s sprung up. “Yeah. I gotta...”

For once you leave by the door, instead of just shoving a window open. You figure it’d just be more awkward making everyone watch you jump out a window, even if that’s kind of what you feel like doing.

\--

Pyralspite is curled up around the trunk of Terezi’s tree, quiet and baleful. You stop an appropriate distance away and cup your hands around your mouth. “TZ! Make your luthuth not eat me, pleathe!”

There’s a thump, and then suddenly Terezi is against the railing that runs around her hive, white-knuckled as she clings to it. The reason she wanted someone is immediately obvious: her face is covered in teal blood, drying on her chin and around her mouth. As far as you can tell, it’s coming from her nose.

“Pyralspite,” she says, her voice wobbling slightly, “don’t eat him. He’s not very nutritious.” It comes out glubby and indistinct, and you frown at the sound.

You kick off and land next to Terezi, giving her lusus a wide berth. “Fuck, what happened to you?” This close, you can tell that her nose is broken, and her bottom lip is split just to complete the issue. “Did you fall out of your tree or what?”

Terezi hiccups slightly, and only then do you realise that she’s holding back tears and feel like the asshole you are. “Gamzee happened, idiot! If you aren’t going to fix me then kindly fly off into the sunrise.” When you don’t say anything, she shifts uncomfortably. “Sollux?”

“What?”

“Oh, you didn’t fly off,” she says, and then it hits you: Without her nose, Terezi is blind.

“I wish KK wath here,” you say as you grab her by the elbow and drag her inside. “He’th a lot better at thwearing. TZ, what the hell pothethed you to go and get your fucking nothe broken?”

She staggers in your wake, bumps her hip on the door and falls into the seat that you drop her into. Even after the whole FLARP debacle, you have never seen Terezi Pyrope helpless, and you’re torn between irritation and fear at the result.

“Oh yes, I walked up to Gamzee and said, hey Gamz, why don’t you break my nose, because I am incredibly clever like that,” Terezi spits. It would probably be a lot more effective at striking fear into your heart if she wasn’t looking in the completely wrong direction.

You sigh and rub your face. “B-R-B.”

“Nerd,” Terezi retorts, and curls up on the seat with her knees to her chest.

You find a towel in the storage block in the hall and wet it in the nutrition block’s sink. Terezi is grateful when you come back, even if she doesn’t want to show it. You carefully mop the blood off her face without bumping her nub or the split in her lip, which is easy enough. You’re used to cleaning yourself up after overextending your powers.

The break looks simple enough once you see it without the protective coating of blood Terezi was nurturing. You pinch her nose between two fingers and drag down, wincing in sympathy when it grates back into alignment.

Terezi’s eyes water, and you wipe even more teal off her face.

“Thank you for the warning, Appleberry, that was very kind of you,” she snarks.

“No problem,” you say, and toss the towel in the general direction of her sink. “Now you get to explain yourthelf, and I get to point and laugh.”

Terezi shifts over on her seat. It’s huge and plush and hideously coloured, just like everything else in her hive, and the two of you can easily fit your skinny asses on it if you don’t mind being a bit squished. You settle in next to her, because if you’re perfectly honest with yourself, you want nothing more than to protect Terezi from her own dumbass self, and you think it’s probably mutual.

“I decided to court Gamzee,” Terezi finally mutters.

“Court,” you say, disbelievingly. “ _Court_. TZ, if you’re going to be thitting here and making juthtithe punth, I’m out.”

She punches you in the shoulder. As always, it is incredibly painful. “You flew all this way, your protest is weak and the court does not accept it.”

“I wath at KK’th,” you say, and belatedly add, “Objection. Thuck it.”

“Whatever,” she says, and you can tell she’s rolling her eyes even if she has the same all-sclera advantage you do. “Gamz punched me in the face. I’m not sure if that’s a yes or a no.”

“It’th a ‘you’re not going there,’” you say, and cut her off when she opens her mouth. “ _No_ , TZ. Kithmetheth don’t pull that shit. Do you really want another Vrithka?”

“Low blow,” she says, quietly.

“That’th what I’m here for,” you say. “Why are you even looking for a kithmethith anyway? I didn’t think you cared.”

She twists to look up at you, and by some magic manages to actually meet your eyes. “Sollux, you are as stupid as I am blind,” she says, pityingly, which is entirely wrong. “You’re telling me you’ve started filling your quadrants with no regard as to the fact that drone season is nigh?” At your silence, she shakes her head.  “I tried, Your Honour, but the subject is dumber than a box of rocks and would rather have sex with computers.”

“Gross, TZ,” you say.

“As gross as you,” she says, and rests her head on your shoulder, her eyes drooping closed. “What were you doing at Karkles’ hive, my favourite technophile?”

“Oh, you know, theduthing hith network, plugging hith portth...” Before you can talk yourself out of it, you say, “He’th going to throw a revolution to thupport Feferi’th claim.”

Terezi nearly gores you with a horn as she sits up. “He’s _what_?” Before you can repeat yourself, she growls and stands up. “Nookfondling _jerk_ , this is the worst time _possible_ for me to not be able to see.” She bumps into a desk and then slides her hands along the bottom of it. You’re about to ask just how insane she has gone and if you should call the drones when there’s a click and a hidden compartment slides out the side of the desk.

She takes a necklace from it, a plain silver chain with... Karkat’s sign on it. You didn’t think they’d ever gotten close enough to wear each other’s symbols.

She holds out a hand to you, and when you give her yours she places the necklace in your hand and wraps your fingers closed around it. “I’m going to be laid up for a few days until I can see properly again. You need to tell Kanaya that the Iron Infidel is walking again. Understand?”

“No,” you say, bewilderment rising around you.

“Give the symbol to Eridan and tell him to research the Church of the Sufferer,” Terezi says, ignoring you. “He’ll understand. I’d do it myself, but I can’t type like this.” She takes your hand in both of hers. “Do not let anybody else see the symbol,” she warns you in the most serious tones you’ve ever heard from her. “It’s a culling offense to have it.”

“But KK-” you protest.

She smiles tightly. “Karkat is very lucky in his friends.” She spins you around and gives you a swat on the ass. “Go. Pyralspite will take care of me.”

“No Gamzee,” you call over your shoulder as you climb onto the railing.

“No promises,” she returns, and pushes you off.

\--

Feferi and Aradia have left by the time you get back to Karkat’s hive, in order to get home by sunrise. Judging from the way Eridan is sprawled over Karkat’s lap as they watch one of the many shitty romcoms Karkat lays claim to, you suspect he’s staying the day. You sit on his legs when he refuses to make space and pelt the necklace at his face.

Karkat catches it. “Why do you have a necklace with my sign on it?” he asks, turning the pendant over in his hands.

“Beatth me,” you say. “TZ thaid Eridan should rethearch - shit, what wath it - the Church of the Thufferer. I gueth that hath thomething to do with it.” You spread your arms over the back of the seating block and sigh. “What’d I mith?”

“Not much.” Karkat finally pauses the movie after dropping the necklace on Eridan’s chest and nearly tipping all three of you over in his lunge for the remote. “We have to figure out who we’re going to target for conversion first, I guess.”

You take off your glasses and let yourself loll. Flying yourself around isn’t exactly taxing, but you did a lot of it, and now there’s all this shit to take in. “That’s you and FF then,” you say as you crick your neck. Then you make the mistake of opening your eyes.

You definitely interrupted Karkat and Eridan in one of their famed movie not-dates. They were relaxed before you showed up, and now they’re tense and ready for the next thing to go down. And of course Terezi had to remind you of drone season, and how it might show up before Her Imperial Condescension deigns to appear from the other side of the universe.

You groan to yourself and lever yourself upright. “I’ve got a lead on a redblood ident for you, KK,” you say, scrubbing your face as tiredness settles over you. You can make it back to your hivestem if you leave now. “Tho I thwear by my apicultureth, if I catch you and ED making unfulfilled googly eyeth becauthe you’re too buthy worrying about your blood, I will explode your huthktop and laugh.”

This time, you leave by the window. 


	6. Chapter 6

The last time you talked to Kanaya was because she couldn’t figure out her mouse was unplugged. The time before that, her display’s connector had come loose and everything was red and green. She’s cool enough when she’s not telling you to help her fix things, but you don’t think you’ve ever initiated a conversation with her in your life. Clicking on her handle feels strange.

\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has started trolling grimAuxiliatrix [GA] --   
TA: hey kn   
GA: Sollux   
GA: An Unexpected Pleasure I Must Admit   
TA: ju2t iin ca2e iim goiing two 2ay thii2 now   
TA: thii2 ii2 a computer help free chat zone   
TA: no fiixiing my2teriiou2ly di2appeariing iicon2 wiill occur iin thii2 chatlog   
GA: I Wont Pretend Im Not Disappointed   
TA: and 2o ii2 your hu2ktop ii know   
TA: look tz 2ent me   
TA: 2omethiing about an iiron iinfiidel and kk   
TA: ii dont know iim tiired a2 2hiit   
GA: Oh   
GA: Yes It Seems That Computer Help Would Be An Inappropriate Topic    
GA: There Is Simply No Way To Segue From That   
TA: 2o what ii2 iit   
TA: tz wa2 beiing my2teriiou2   
GA: I Think I Should Talk To Karkat About It First   
GA: And Then He Can Tell You If He Wants   
TA: why ii2 thii2 my liife   
GA: Because Sadly Your Friends Are All Much More Secretly Interesting Than You   
TA: well fuck   
TA: ii never thought iid be the boriing one   
TA: but whatever me22age receiived riight kn   
GA: Loud And Clear   
TA: 2ee you around then   
GA: Goodbye   
\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has ceased trolling grimAuxiliatrix [GA] --

\-- grimAuxiliatrix [GA] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   
GA: So How Would I Get A Missing Icon Back Theoretically   
TA: oh come on

It takes you an hour - _an hour_ \- to walk Kanaya through getting her icons back, because she somehow discovered a non-existent keyboard shortcut to clearing the desktop. She doesn’t go offline after, instead idling out with a status that says _Practicing Topiary Skills_.

As with many things about your friends, you still don’t want to know.

You don’t go offline either, because you’ve transcended your tired state and come out the other side of can’t even fucking tell what you are any more. You check on your Trojan, instead. It’s disseminated far and wide, but you’re able to eliminate a vast swathe of the pingbacks as planetside. You set up a filter so you won’t have to look at the useless results anymore, and then turn your attention to the ones that might actually be helpful.

They’re not very helpful. Most of them, when you chase them back, are supply ships - food, clothing, oxygen, metal, paper, whatever. You pull copies of their routine flight paths and then leave the connections be. They’d be useful if you were in a position to create an embargo, but unless Feferi manages to turn her own fleet, that’ll never happen.

It makes you feel better to have the plans in your knowledgebase anyway.

The network protections are obviously better on militarised ships, or you’d have been in there already. Still, it only takes one idiot who wants questionably-legal entertainment and has run out of credit for the equinox, and you’re in. And, as Karkat is fond of saying, there’s one hatched every minute.

You let it go again and lean back in your chair, feeling your bones crick into place. So far you’ve managed to avoid thinking too hard about what you’re doing, how many laws said and unsaid you’re breaking. It’s easy for you, because the Empire is unimaginative. When you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail; when you have a disloyal psionic, everything looks like a helmsblock. When you have a loyal psionic, everything looks like a helmsblock anyway, so you don’t have much to lose.

There are cold, hard calculations that you have to run for everyone else, though. Karkat’s an obvious case, and if he’s lucky the Empire will kill him quietly rather than make an example of him. You already have daymares about Aradia strung up and lifeless, and you know you don’t have the strength to end it - you hope she chooses good quadrantpartners. Vriska could probably be implicated through the ident she’d getting for you, but you couldn’t care less, really. With her luck she’d end up employed by the Empire instead, which is the most alarming thing you can possibly think of. Terezi would hang, Kanaya would never see the sun again.

Eridan and Feferi, though. Feferi would be so much tyrian on a fork, tossed beneath the waves with a lack of ceremony. Eridan would say something incredibly stupid and end up the target of a laughsassin, and be held up amongst highbloods as an example of What Happens To Idiots Who Go Against The Empire.

It’s not a pleasant prospect. And, being perfectly honest, it’s a very likely one.

You don’t think you’re going to be sleeping for a while.

\--

\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has started trolling apocalypseArisen [AA] --   
TA: 2o entiirely prediictably iim haviing 2econd thought2   
AA: i think this time youre just going to have to ignore your duality fetish!   
TA: oh my god aa iit2 not a fetii2h   
AA: i know your search history 0u0   
TA: 2hut up   
AA: twins   
TA: plea2e 2hut up   
AA: 0n0 you dont want to talk to your moirail   
TA: 2eriiou2ly   
TA: have you thought about thii2   
TA: ha2 any of u2 actually thought about iit   
TA: we are all goiing two diie really horriible death2 and ii   
AA: dont want that?   
AA: sollux you are very sweet but also very silly   
AA: death is nothing to be scared of   
AA: its just a thing and it doesnt define us   
AA: who we are and what we do defines us   
AA: every ghost ive ever met tells me about all the amazing things they did in life and who they loved and what they stood for   
AA: thats pretty telling   
TA: ok but diid they diie 2creamiing and iin paiin becau2e ii thiink that2 a pretty iimportant component   
AA: did you hear our voices   
TA: ...no   
AA: then youre just worrying   
AA: id rather hurt for my friends than be safe from my enemies   
AA: and you would too or i wouldnt be alive   
TA: fuck you for knowiing me   
AA: <>   
TA: <>   
AA: we good?   
TA: were good   
\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has ceased trolling apocalypseArisen [AA] --

You drum your fingers on your desk, tapping out a rhythm that’s been in your head for sweeps, before considering your next move. You’re support, sure, but the role of good support is to pre-emptively supply things before they’re needed. The thing is, you are absolutely terrible at this. You’ve never been in a coup before, you only paid enough attention to your basic history schoolfeeding to scrape a pass in it and coups weren’t exactly the main subject matter, and to be entirely honest the only reason you know the P is silent is because Eridan said it and you thought he was being a douche until you looked it up.

Point is, you don’t know how coups _work_. Code is easy. You can rip it apart and stitch it together and iterate things until something works and hey, you’re learning. People? You have no idea why anyone puts up with you. People do not work on a system you comprehend. You hope Feferi and Karkat know how to convince others over, because you are zero help there.

Speaking of people, you have things to check up on. This is quite possibly the most communication you’ve had with anyone who is not, in fact, your own brain telling you you’re worthless in a long time.

You ping Terezi with a _hey crunchnode2_  and Vriska with a _need a progre22 report ye2terday 2piiderbiitch_ and sit back to wait and see who answers first. Your money’s on Vriska.

Predictably, you’re correct.

AG: Sooooooool!   
AG: What are you doing up so l8?

You check the clock and - yeah, okay, it could conceivably be called early by now, and nobody ever said you weren’t petty.

TA: iit2 early   
TA: and gettiing a head 2tart on my errand2, liike biitchiing at you untiil you 2kiip the bull2hiit and giive me an update   
TA: you 2aiid a week iit2 been a week   
AG: Ugh, ped8nt.   
AG: 8ut whatever! I was going to message you anyway.   
AG: I have a naaaaaaaame.   
TA: you know what   
TA: that2 fiine   
TA: what ii2 iit   
AG: Uh-uh! We haven’t discussed payment.   
TA: 2ure iill pay you a credit for each biit of u2eful iinformatiion you giive me   
TA: let2 2ee   
TA: youre giiviing me a name   
TA: one cred for you   
TA: enjoy iit vk   
TA: enjoy iit   
AG: Ugh. Uuuuuuuugh!!!!!!!!    
AG: You are TERRI8LE at negoti8ion, Captor!   
AG: Now, I can give you this name over a very unsecured pu8lic network and you can give me a cred and we can 8e enemies forever.   
AG: Or you could come meet me and I’ll give you his dum8 file in exchange for lots of creds and a teensy favour, and I won’t even murder anyone!   
TA: let me thiink about whether or not ii want two get wiithiin 2piittiing dii2tance of you.

You do actually stop to think. Your first answer is no, your second hell no, and your third is a reluctant admission that you need the ident for KK or he will shout your hearducts off your head.

TA: drop the favour and iit2 a deal   
AG: No can do, Sol! I need someone of your talents to do me a solid and not 8e a huge cry8a8y over it.   
AG: You know where my hive is. Meet me there l8r, and we’ll talk!   
TA: no   
AG: Yes!   
TA: wow you really cant take no for an an2wer can you   
AG: I don’t know why you’re 8eing so apprehensive a8out it! We’re aaaaaaaall on the same side here. I can’t even get mad and feed you to Spidermom now!   
TA: thii2 ii2 me not beiing rea22ured by that 2tatement   
AG: I’m not gonna hurt you, Sol! Pir8’s honour :::;)   
TA: you make a 2iingle move ii dont liike and ii take the other eye   
TA: and iim telliing tz that iim vii2iitiing you   
TA: ii dont come back and youll fiind out what beiing lu2u2meat ii2 liike   
AG: 8een there, done that. How’s  8?   
TA: you know what   
TA: ii can only make niine   
AG: Petty!!!!!!!!   
\-- arachnidsGrip [AG] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --

You let out a long, shaky sigh and slide down in your chair. Vriska is exhausting.

TZ still hasn’t answered, so she’s probably asleep, since most sane trolls are sleeping right about now. You don’t know why Vriska was awake while sunlight still outlines your blackout curtains, and you don’t particularly care so long as it’s not going to get you dead.

You stare at the clock in your system tray. It stares back, and you know from long experience that the fucker will always win a staring competition and make you hate yourself in the process. It takes a monumental amount of willpower to lever yourself out of your seat and peel your shirt over your head, and you drop it as you stumble towards your cupe. There’s time for a good nap before you have to get going, and you can pick all your clothes off the floor later. You don’t want to face Vriska on no sleep.

\--

You claw your way out of the cupe and have to pathetically slop your way to the tiny ablutions stall in your hiveblock, leaving a trail of sopor that’ll be hell to scrub up once you can actually be bothered, once it’s hardened and dry. Ablutions are hot and short and mostly consist of you wondering why you’re not getting water in your eyes until you realise you forgot to take off your glasses. They get scrubbed off before you do and carefully placed outside where you won’t tread on them.

As usual, there’s no food in your hiveblock. You have a tendency to buy shitty food and eat it all at once, then experiment with alternating starvation and leaving the hive to pay someone to give you something to eat. This seems like an awesome way of life the first night and then you wonder why nobody has culled you yet for the next couple of weeks.

You can eat on the way to Vriska’s.

Trollian, lit up with messages, is the first thing you see when you wake your screen up. You wonder when you got so popular. Terezi’s answered you, so you look at that first, expecting some hilarious keysmash at best.

\-- gallowsCalibrator [GC] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   
GC: 1 F33L L1K3 PYR4LSP1T3 ST3PP3D ON MY H34D.   
GC: TH4NK YOU FOR R3M1ND1NG M3.   
TA: no problem   
TA: how are you typiing   
GC: TH3 SW3LL1NG MOSTLY W3NT DOWN WH3N 1 W4S 4SL33P SO 1 C4N SM3LL W1TH ONLY 4 MOD1CUM OF P41N NOW   
GC: 4 SM1DG3N   
TA: whoa hold up ii2 iit a modiicum or smiidgen   
TA: the court cant handle thii2 uncertaiinty   
GC: 1T 1S 4 FUCK YOU.    
GC: 1 H4D TO PUT TH3 M4GN1F13R ON 4ND YOUR S4FFRON-MUST4RD T3XT 1S G1V1NG M3 4 H34D4CH3   
GC: SO WH4T 1S 1T   
TA: ii have two meet vk later   
TA: liike niine   
TA: iif ii dont check iin by ten thiirty 2iic your dragon on her   
GC: SH3 H4S B33N LUST1NG 4FT3R TROLL1SH FL3SH L4T3LY   
GC: V3RY W3LL 4PPL3B3RRY   
GC: 4T T3N TH1RTY ON3 1 SH4LL STORM VR1SK4S G4T3S FOR YOU   
TA: you can fly over them   
GC: T3CHN1C4LLY SH3 DO3SNT 4CTU4LLY H4V3 4NY SO TH3 PO1NT 1S MOOT

You also have unread messages from Karkat, and you’re curious about the whole mysterious thing Terezi and Kanaya are pulling with you as unwitting messenger, so checking his window comes next.

\-- carcinoGeneticst [CG] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   
CG: FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF   
CG: FFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU   
CG: UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCCCCCCC   
CG: CCCCCCCCCCCCCKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK   
\-- carcinoGeneticst [CG] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --

\-- carcinoGeneticst [CG] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   
CG: I LOATHE PREDESTINATION.   
CG: YOU KNOW HOW WE ALWAYS JOKED THAT I WOULD ONLY FIND PITCH FULFILMENT WITH PAST ME?   
CG: HA HA UNIVERSE JOKE IS ON ME I GET IT.   
CG: FUCK PAST ME.   
CG: FUCK PAST ME WHO WASN’T EVEN ME.   
CG: FUCK HIM SLOWLY, PAINFULLY, AND HATEFULLY. FUCK HIM, FOR HE IS THE PERSONIFICATION OF EVERYTHING I HAVE EVER HATED AND DERIDED ABOUT MY FATE AND ITS LIKELIHOOD OF TRAGEDY.  MAY PAST ME JERK IT TO THE THOUGHT OF HOW HE IS TOTALLY SCREWING OVER FUTURE HIM AND HOW HILARIOUS THAT WILL BE IN THOUSANDS OF SWEEPS!   
CG: I THINK I’M GOING TO THROW UP.   
\-- carcinoGeneticst [CG] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --

\-- carcinoGeneticst [CG] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   
CG: I HAVE LOST CONTROL OF MY LIFE.   
\-- carcinoGeneticst [CG] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --

You decide that maybe asking about it can wait.

\--

You split the difference and get to Vriska’s at about half-past eight. Equius’ hive glows in the distance, but the ravine they live on is eerily silent and still. As usual, you can’t help looking at the overhang Vriska’s lusus used to shelter under, expecting white spindles of legs to creep out at the feel of your psi in the air. As usual, it’s still dead.

Vriska sits on her steps, chin in hand and elbow on knee, idly tapping away at her palmtop. She doesn’t look up, even when you land, but you’re not playing her games. After several minutes of neither of you saying anything, she gets up in one long movement, stretching herself out on tiptoe before landing solidly back on her feet. “You’re late!”

“I’m early,” you counter.

She reaches out and pats you on the cheek condescendingly before you can flinch back. “Seller makes the rules, Sol.”

You slap her hand down. “I wath promithed a file.”

You think you see a flash of anger as she looks down and back to pull a data unit out of her back pocket, but when she looks up again and dangles it in front of your face her expression is as smug and taunting as ever. “Relax, Sol! I got the goods if you’ve got the creds.” She slots the unit into her palmtop and shoves the screen in front of your face. “Never doubt a Serket!”

“I thought it wath never trutht a Therket.” You lean in and check the data. If it’s fake, then Vriska is better with computers than she actually possesses the patience to be. “Fine. How much?”

She names a figure that would wipe out your savings. You laugh in her face and optimistically shoot for half your savings while waving goodbye to upgrading your setup for a while. She laughs back and says she’ll do that for _two_ favours, and you decide that not owing Vriska Serket extra favours is worth all the money you have and you can overclock your setup more if you can rig together a cooling system.

“Done,” you say, and show her the transfer receipt on your palmtop. She refreshes hers and nods, then flicks the data unit at you, which you have to fumble embarrassingly at lest you accidentally fry it by catching it mid-air. “Favour?”

All of a sudden, she’s thrown an arm over your shoulders and is pressing up against your side. It’s not sexual, you’re pretty sure, just Vriska’s sense of theatrics and lack of respect for personal space, but it makes your skin crawl anyway. This close, you can see that she’s put her lipstick on a little outside the borders of her mouth to exaggerate her lips, and the tiny clumps of mascara in her eyelashes. Her mechanical eye darts all over the place, and you wonder what she’s observing.

“I need _you_ ,” she says, pressing a finger into your chest, “to do a little research for _me_.” Another data unit appears in a flourish of her fingers; apparently Vriska has been studying sleight of hand. She waggles it in front of your face until you take it. “No rush.”

“We’re quitth,” you say, shoving everything into your pockets, making sure that nothing is going to fall out. There’s no way you’re going to be all, _hey 2up ii lo2t that data, got another copy?_

“Not yet,” she says, and pinches your cheek before stepping away. “But since you’re doing something for me, I’ll do something for you!” At your total lack of response, she rolls her eyes. “Wow, thankuthhhh Vrithka. _C’mon_ , fly-boy! I’m helping you help me.” She spins you around until you’re facing Equius’ hive. “Zahhak has all the shit you need to make that ident from the data. The sooner you get it done, the sooner you’re not swooning over how Karkat can’t live without your help and doing _my_ work, so get the fuck over there.”

\--

Aurthour doesn’t answer when you pound on the door. You stand there and shift from foot to foot before knocking again, putting your shoulder into it so the sound echoes far enough that Vriska can probably hear it. You’d just leave, but if Equius has the shit you need - mostly the card printer and maybe some circuitry gear - you do kind of need it. It’s not like you can afford to buy your own now.

Equius himself opens the door as the echoes of your knocking die down, and when he sees you he automatically looks for Aradia before looking back to you. “Captor.”

You rub your face, already tired from leaving your hive, and try to figure out how to get Equius to let you use his lab without going through his if-you-were-meant-to-have-a-lab-you’d-be-a-highblood dickery. “Look, thith ith weird,” you start, and watch him frown, “but I need a better lab than I have acceth to. Can I borrow yourth?”

He looks inside before looking back to you. “It’s not a good time.”

“I don’t need thupervision,” you snap, and then droop in defeat. “Fuck, thorry. Your lab, your ruleth.”

He winces when you swear, but doesn’t slam the door in your face, which you take as a good sign. “Aurthour has injured himself and requires my attention,” Equius says. You hadn’t actually expected an explanation from sweaty casteist dude #1. Maybe you’re starting to grow on him. He sighs before saying, “If you truly don’t require assistance...”

You have to blink a couple of times before it sinks in, and then you shake your head. “Bathic thilicon work, I jutht don’t have the shit at my hive.”

He steps back to let you in, then closes the door behind you. “You know where everything is, I expect.”

\--

Being perfectly honest, the ident chip is more complicated than you implied it would be, because you are a jerk who will do anything for lab time. Equius does a lot of modding for his robotics, so he has all the supplies you need, including a stockpile of basic RFIDs you can tear apart with your brain under magnification and alter to suit. You also have to rip apart the RFID in your ident to compare, but putting things back together is the easy part. There are a few architectural differences that you painstakingly mould into the blank RFID over the course of hours, etching microns at a time.

You think of Equius, doing this with hands and tools, and wonder at where all his uncontrollable strength goes when he does this fiddly shit.

Thankfully he has his own read/write unit, because building one from cobbled-together plans is beyond your patience once you’ve modified the physicalities of the chip until it matches yours. You scan your ident (shoved back together, which was an adventure in itself) through the unit and start pulling apart the code.

The feeling that somebody is watching you creeps up on you, unsettles you enough to pull you out of identifying which strings of data do what, an undetermined amount of time later. You think you’ve probably been at this for a while.

“I do not understand,” Equius says, carefully, “why you think that your fate is to be a Helmsman.”

Your fingers freeze on the keyboard as your whole body locks down. You’d managed to stop thinking about helming for a while, since you had a task to focus on, but no. Fucking _highbloods_. Fucking highbloods and - ha - the blueblood’s burden, like it’s their job to save you from yourself _but they’ll just cram you in a helmsblock anyway_ -

You start typing again, wiping out the default identifying number and putting in the one in the redblood’s file. You haven’t looked at his name. You haven’t wondered how he died. For your purposes it’s enough that he exists and that he’s dead and that the Empire doesn’t know yet. “Think of it ath a choithe,” you say flatly, detached. The air tastes stale when you breathe.

“A choice,” Equius says.

You slam your hands down on the keyboard in frustration. “It’th not my fucking job to explain my life choitheth to you, alright? Sure, I could probably fucking, I don’t know, program shit for the Empire for a few thweepth - I’d probably even be able to do it without faking anything thinthe I’m jutht that fucking fantathtic - but what happenth when my performanthe thlipth and thuddenly I’m more valuable ath a Helmthman?”

“I-”

“They offer me credth,” you say, all the anger gone out of your voice. Because you’re not angry, you’re just incredibly fucking tired of this argument, with yourself, with spectres of the people you love in your head, with cold hard logic. With people who think you’re better than you are. “They threaten AA. They bribe ED. They get thomeone like VK to get me to agree. The only choithe I have ith now or later, tho thtop thinking I’m a shitty perthon for picking _now_.”

You pull your ident out of the read/write machine and carefully put in KK’s new chip. Equius doesn’t say anything, you can’t hear him move, you’re not turning around to see what’s going on. You write the redblood’s data onto the blank chip, then read it to make sure that everything’s correct. Of course, there was something you missed that’s making it error out spectacularly, so you start debugging with a sigh.

Some time later, you realise that Equius left. You mentally slap yourself for feeling bad about it.


	7. Chapter 7

You wake up and-

-and you had fallen asleep, what the _fuck_ was wrong with you. You are distinctly aware that ‘not knowing your own boundaries’ is what’s wrong with you, but you never thought you’d be stupid enough to fall asleep anywhere outside your own hive or maybe Aradia’s, doors locked and safe from idiots who want to get a jumpstart on owning a psionic. There’s something heavy across your shoulders and you flail at it, your brain completely convinced that it is something holding you down, keeping you captured until whoever caught you is ready to use you, until it slips and crashes to the floor and you realise it was just a blanket.

Your ident is stuck to your arm. You peel it away as you calm down. You’re in Equius’ lab still, and now you remember how your eyelids got heavier, and everything was blurry, and you were sort of slumped over the desk because holding your body up was too much effort. No wonder you fell asleep.

KK’s new ident is still open in Photochop, about half-done. The fonts were hard to find, you remember, as was an appropriate photo of him, and in the end you had to bug TZ to send you her collection of 1NCR1M1N4T1NG 4DOR4BLOODTH1RSTY 3V1D3NC3, but now all you have to do is complete the stupid thing, print it, and throw it at his ungrateful face.

You are doing your best to not think of the blanket. Or the fact that you’re still alive. You’re probably going to have to burn your clothes when you leave, just in case he somehow managed to get one of those tiny trackers that highbloods can actually afford on you. You can handle yourself in a fight, but that’s not much use if someone sneaks up on you while you’re alone and surprises you.

It doesn’t take long to finish up the ident, matching it up with yours and some pictures of redblood idents you find on the net to make sure that there aren’t any differences between castes that would give the fake away. Equius has a card printer, for whatever reason; probably more robotics shit. The first version you print has horrific colour problems. After a lot of fiddling with colour settings that you don’t know much about, you get a decent result on the fourth try. Attaching the RFID is simple enough, and when you scan it to check it’s all working properly, you get all the information you need and no jumbled-up text at all.

It was surprisingly easy, forging an ident. The proof is in the testing, of course, but you aren’t going to lie: you’re tempted to make a tyrian ident and see if the drones implode.

You pick up the blanket and turn it over in your hands. It’s thick, the kind of blanket that trolls without body heat need, but the thickness is probably the reason you didn’t have any daymares. It’s enough to be a pile all of its own. You fold it up and leave it on the chair, then search around for a sticky note. You don’t particularly want to talk to Equius after blowing up at him before, and everyone has sticky notes somewhere. You manage to find some in the bottom of a drawer and stick one to the screen of the computer you were using with _thank2_ written on it. You decide to leave off the _for not murderiing me_ , since it’s probably impolite.

That done, the near-sociability itching at the back of your neck, you make your escape.

\--

Your hive is comfortable and familiar, with all the time you’ve been gone from it lately. You want to curl up in your cupe and sleep forever, but instead you shell off your clothes and carefully put them in the least-crowded corner until you can figure out what to do with them. Burning them seems like an inelegant solution when you’re mainly running on suspicion and paranoia. If there is a tracker, you could do more with it than burn it. If there isn’t, you don’t particularly want to burn your clothes.

Once you’ve changed, you feed Bicyclops, who still hasn’t figured out that ‘Sollux appearing’ and ‘food’ are directly correlated. To be fair, you probably took a while to connect the dots when you were a grub.

All your hive-upkeep done, you settle in front of the computer and see if Karkat’s done cursing. He’s not online, but Eridan is, and that’s good enough for your purposes.

\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has started trolling caligulasAquarium [CA] --   
TA: 2o ha2 the apocalyp2e gone down or what?   
CA: fuck off sol   
TA: wow 2orry diid ii ruiin your happy moment   
TA: fiinally 2omeone liike2 me and that2 totally why iim 2tariing at my palmtop de2pondently whiile kk ii2 nowhere to be found   
TA: actually you know what ii ju2t realii2ed ii dont giive a 2hiit   
TA: get kk for me.   
CA: howw about no   
CA: look its twwo letters an evverythin   
CA: go ahead an parse it any day   
TA: okay fiine obviiou2ly ii cant e2cape thii2   
TA: what happened and why am ii not talkiing two kk riight now?   
CA: wwhat happened   
CA: wwhat fuckin happened he asks me   
CA: i dont rightly knoww captor   
CA: maybe it has somethin to do wwith you SICCIN KAN AN TER ON HIM   
TA: hey whoa hold iit   
TA: ii 2iicced nobody on anybody   
TA: kn had 2ome iinfo for kk on 2omethiing 2ecret that2 up two hiim two tell me about and iid liike two know but that2 iit   
TA: what the fuck happened   
CA: he started screechin about predestination an bein grubsat by midbloods an kicked me out on my ass as soon as i wwoke up is wwhat happened   
CA: thanks a lot sol   
CA: thanks   
CA: a   
CA: lot   
TA: 2o you dont actually know.   
TA: where even are you?   
CA: none a your fuckin business   
TA: ok OBVIIOU2LY youre 2iittiing out2iide kk2 beiing lame 2o hey how about you do me a favour and go back iin and tell hiim two get onliine iin2tead of throwiing a dramatiic 2niit   
\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has ceased trolling caligulasAquarium [CA] --   
CA: i aint wwaitin outside howw lame do you think i am   
CA: luckily for you i aint left the neighbourhood yet

You check your usual sites while you wait for something to happen. The internet has been amazingly boring while you’ve been gone, and you close all your tabs halfway through, deeming any news not worth the effort. You’re probably going to have to start paying a lot more attention to your off-planet feeds now, for Feferi’s sake, but you find it hard to care. You’re going to have to make some spiders that search for relevant keywords and feed you the data, so you won’t have to go through it all manually.

You pull the other data unit Vriska gave you out of your pocket and look at it. You’re not sure you want to know what Vriska needs a favour with, but if you skip out on it now she’d probably get you _and_ KK culled and the memory would keep her warm for sweeps to come. You are not giving her the satisfaction.

Of course, either way she wins. She’s gotten better at that, since the FLARP debacle, according to Terezi.

On the data unit is a text file called README!!!!!!!! and a spreadsheet called coordin8s. You open the former first, after renaming it to contain less exclamation marks. Vriska’s quirk is an obnoxious crime against trollkind and you don’t want to tolerate it more than you have to.

Hey, Sooooooool! I’m sure you’re wondering what someone as rad as me needs a four-eyes neeeeeeeerd like you for, and since I 8n’t got time to f8ck around, I’ll just come out and say it. The other file is a 8unch of co-ordin8s. Since you’ll find out anyway, I 8n’t gonna front. They’re from potential sh8pwr8cks! And not the terrestrial kind. If you got a pro8lem with it, shove it!!!!!!!!

Since SOME of us can’t fly and I 8n’t got the time to go hiking, that means I gotta get a chump like you to do the dirty work. Check the places out and report 8ack.

You bury your head in your hands. _Fuck Vriska Serket_. She’s offline, but you send her your thoughts anyway.

\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has started trolling arachnidsGrip [AG] --   
TA: hey vk   
TA: how about no   
TA: how about never   
TA: how about you come near me or aa and ii will tear you the fuck up   
TA: how2 that for you   
TA has sent file ‘plea2eohplea2ebe2tupiidenoughtworunthii2.~ath’   
\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has ceased trolling arachnidsGrip [AG] --

After a moment’s hesitation you send a message to AA as well, even though she’s probably cavorting through an ancient tomb and straightening the tapestries, or whatever she does when she’s got her palmtop off.

\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has started trolling apocalypseArisen [AA] --   
TA: hey aa   
TA: ii think vk miight be planning trouble   
TA: keep your guard up and don’t let anyone know where you are unle22 iit’2, liike, tz   
TA: 2hiit thii2 ii2 my fault   
TA: iim 2orry   
\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has ceased trolling apocalypseArisen [AA] --

The apology is woefully inadequate, after you’d both sworn no more FLARP and no more Vriska. You’re putting AA in danger by refusing Vriska, but you’d be putting AA in danger by obliging Vriska, too. The fact that you needed Vriska’s dubious abilities in order to secure KK’s safety doesn’t come into it.

How many ships have even fucking wrecked on Alternian soil? It doesn’t seem like there’d be enough to piece one together, if that’s what Vriska’s planning. You open the coordinates file and overlay them on a map. There’s only five or so, but they’re spread out beyond walking distance.

You close the map. Why waste rocket boot fuel if you can just get the psionic to do it, right?

Karkat comes online in all his hemonymous glory, and you yank Vriska’s data unit out of your tower.  There’ll be time enough to deal with it when Vriska starts bitching eights at you, as long as AA knows to be careful. For now, you toss the unit into the corner behind your silicomb hives and completely refuse to think about it.

\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has started trolling carcinoGeneticist [CG] --   
TA: hey kk   
CG: SO, AS IT TURNS OUT, I PROBABLY OWE SOME APOLOGIES.   
CG: I WAS   
CG: FUCKING POLEAXED WHEN KANAYA STARTED TALKING TO ME LAST NIGHT AND THE WHOLE SUFFERER THING IS A LOT LIKE BEING CLOTHESLINED BY EQUIUS, IN THAT IT IS UNCOMFORTABLE FOR ALL PARTIES INVOLVED AND INCREDIBLY LIKELY TO KILL ME.   
CG: SO I’M THIS REVOLUTIONARY FIGURE REINCARNATED AND CARRYING OUT THE SAME MISSION AND APPARENTLY KANAYA AND TEREZI HAVE BEEN GENETICALLY CHARGED WITH KEEPING ME SAFE BECAUSE FUCK KNOWS I CAN’T DEFEND MYSELF, RIGHT? HAHA! ALSO THE EMPIRE APPARENTLY HAS IT *REALLY* OUT FOR ME, NOT THAT I HADN’T DEDUCED THAT ALREADY WITH MY INCREDIBLE SKILLS OF OBSERVATION AND NIGH-UNSTOPPABLE SELF-PRESERVATION INSTINCTS.   
CG: IT’S NOT LIKE I COULD HAVE DONE WITH KNOWING ABOUT THIS BEFORE I MADE SOME INCREDIBLY POORLY-CONSIDERED LIFE CHOICES AND DECIDED TO PAINT A TARGET ON MY BACK, ONLY THAT TARGET IS ACTUALLY IN THE BULLSEYE OF ANOTHER TARGET THAT WAS SLOPPILY PAINTED ON WHEN MY ANCESTOR WAS DONE PAILING HIMSELF AND SOMEHOW SLIPPING HIS ILL-CONCEIVED GENETIC MATERIAL INTO THE SLURRY OUT OF SOME MAD DESIRE TO PRESERVE HIS MALFUNCTIONING GENES JUST IN CASE THIS DAY WOULD COME, YES, FULL KNOWLEDGE OF WHAT I AM GETTING MYSELF INTO WOULDN’T HAVE HELPED AT ALL!   
TA: holy 2hiit kk   
CG: I KNOW, RIGHT?   
CG: IT’S A LOT TO TAKE IN! AND ERIDAN’S ALL IN A SNIT BECAUSE HE CAN’T FIND THE HISTORY ANYWHERE AND HE’S WHEEDLING AT KANAYA UNDER THE INCORRECT IMPRESSION THAT IT WILL ACTUALLY GET HIM SOMEWHERE.   
CG: FOR ALL THAT, I PROBABLY SHOULDN’T HAVE LIVEBLOGGED THE REVELATION AT YOU. THAT WAS RUDE OF ME. KINDLY DO NOT ALLOW ARADIA TO DESECRATE MY CORPSE AFTER SHE MURDERS ME FOR TAKING LIBERTIES WITH YOUR UNANSWERING CHAT WINDOW.   
TA: no ii mean liike   
TA: ii dont care   
TA: ii have the iident for you iif you want iit   
CG: OH.   
CG: YEAH, THAT’D BE GOOD.   
TA: cool   
TA: iill be over 2oon   
\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has ceased trolling carcinoGeneticist [CG] --   
CG: DID YOU ACTUALLY TAKE IN ANY OF WHAT I SAID, OR   
CG: I’M GOING TO GO OUT ON A LIMB HERE AND SAY NO. NO YOU DID NOT.   
CG: GREAT!

The flight to Karkat’s hive is becoming automatic to you, which is a worrying thing, but at least it lets you zone out for the duration. The voices tend to come back in when you let routine take over, but you can take their low radio-set-to-static hum and you don’t particularly feel like thinking at the moment. You have the feeling that you don’t actually know the people you know, and that’s fine, it’s not like you’ve ever made the effort. But now there are plans and schemes and you’re simultaneously in the middle of it and have no idea what is going on, and if you put a foot wrong you have the nasty feeling that all your friends will die. And you’ve _already_ run the outcomes on this, so there’s no point in thinking about it again.

All the lights are blazing in KK’s hive when you land, which is unusual, and distracts you from the fact that Pyralspite is lying on the ground by the side of the hive.  She stares at you with bottomless red eyes and you raise a hand in greeting, because it always pays to be polite to things that will happily eat you.

Karkat yanks the door open before you even have a chance to knock. “Welcome to the asylum of dead and broken dreams, Captor! You’ll fit right in.”

“Ouch,” you say, and lay a hand on his shoulder. “KK, if you vibrate with pent-up rage any faster, you’re going to explode.”

He seizes the front of your shirt and drags you nose-to-nose. “My hive. Is full. Of _people_ ,” he hisses at you, and even if he’s wearing the dumb contacts you can still see the panic in his eyes. Karkat is not exactly in the running for Most Sociable Mutantblood of the Sweep, which is impressive since it’s probably a field of one.

“Okay,” you say, since agreeing is probably the quickest way to getting him to stop strangling you. If you don’t get a muscle boost in moulting like he did you are going to be very angry at the universe. “Which people?”

“Eridan,” Karkat says. “Terezi. Kanaya.” His fingers relax slightly in your shirt and yes, good, you can breathe fully again.

You use your newfound lung capacity to squeak out, “ _Kanaya_?”

“I know!” Karkat says, and fists his hands in his hair. “Captor, take me away from all this. I will condescend to pose artsily with Aradia if I don’t have to deal with the snarkfest going on in there, just-”

“You’re on your own,” you inform him, and slap the ident against his chest. You think you’d rather take your chances with Vriska than get involved in a conversation that involves Kanaya, Terezi, and Eridan. “Tell everyone I said hi.”

Karkat looks at you flatly. “I thought we were friends.”

Your shoulders sag in defeat. “I hate you. Are we running away or am I offering moral support and conversation bait while you cower in the nutrition block?”

“I won’t be cowering, I’ll be-”

“-strategising?” Terezi finishes, from behind his shoulder. You jump, he shrieks, and she cackles.

Like she’d said last night, the swelling of her broken nose has mostly gone down, but it doesn’t look any less painful. Her eyes are still ringed in bruises, although the darkest points are greenish-blue rather than the straight-up black they were. There’s still a certain glubby quality to her voice, as well, but she seems back up on her feet again. As if to prove the point, she slurps a stripe along Karkat’s cheek. “Embarrassment, panic, and,” she frowns a little and hums thoughtfully, “fleece. I’m still off.”

“Fleece doesn’t have a taste,” Karkat grumbles, scrubbing his cheek with his sleeve. You decide not to point out that for anyone who isn’t Terezi, emotions don’t have a taste either. “If you didn’t get in brawls with Gamzee you’d be much more aware of that fact.”

“He started it,” she says, and ends the conversation there. “Kanaya wants to know how to open your curtains.”

“They don’t open!” He bolts towards the communal entertainment block at the sound of a chainsaw revving up. “Kanaya, no, they don’t-”

There is a moment of silence in the hall, once the chainsaw abruptly cuts out. You scratch the back of one leg with your foot and Terezi takes the opportunity to prod you with her cane. You think that, for once, it may actually be because she needs it to figure out where you are.

“Explain this to me,” you say, and then the both of you wince as Karkat rises in volume to deliver a pointed lecture on the merits of aphorisms, particularly the one where if something isn’t broken you shouldn’t try to fix it. “Without fucking up the explanation like KK.”

“I had so hoped to work ‘shamefucking, vomit-inducing child of many lusii’ into my daily vernacular!” she says. “I will never pass vocabulary standards if you insist on limiting me, Captor.” She sighs and wraps her hands over the head of her cane as she thinks, a habit you know she cultivated deliberately because she likes the feel of it. “Karkat has an ancestor, despite all odds. He was a revolutionary, quite possibly the first, or the first with any measure of success.” She pauses again and bites her lip. “I can’t explain how revolutionary he was. He was raised by a _troll_ , Sollux. He ignored quadrants entirely! He convinced a _lot_ of people that the haemospectrum was inherently flawed.”

“And KK’s flipping his shit because, what? He hates the idea someone else got there first?” You fold your arms and shift your weight. “I swear, if he’s just _nervous-_ ”

“He has good reason to be!” Terezi snaps, and it’s such a departure from her usual tone that you actually flinch. “His ancestor was dragged out and made an example of, burned alive in iron. His co-conspirators did not exactly find themselves on the merciful side of the law, either! You are not _stupid_ , Sollux, and you know Karkat’s worrying.” She jabs you in the chest with her cane. “He worries about himself, yes, but more than that he worries about all of us.”

“So,” you say, slowly, as you let it sink in. “He’s worried that, what, we all die? I could _check_ , fuck.”

“If we go down this path,” Terezi says, then falters. “The Empire will not be kind and it will not be fair. If our Heiress is tangled up in this path and he fails, it won’t be just him. It will be the hopes and futures of everyone he convinces there is a better life.”

You rub your face. “Shit,” you summarise, optimistically.

“Shit,” Terezi agrees. “Kanaya and I are going with him.”

You pause. “Does he know this?”

Your only answer is a grin that spreads slowly across her face, which you suppose is answer enough.

\--

You escape Karkat’s hive after being sandwiched between Terezi and Kanaya for the best part of three hours, while Eridan makes goopy eyes at Karkat, who alternates between making goopy eyes back and shouting a lot. Kanaya mostly remains quiet, although you’re pretty sure she spends a significant portion of Karkat’s rants eyeing you with fashionable intent. It’s eventually decided that Feferi should probably be informed of their intentions before they go flying through the countryside and terrorising small cities.

You’re still not entirely sure why you got dragged into it, but at least you won’t have to learn about it through messaging Karkat and getting a response wailing about how far away he is.

The night is still dark and you’ve never been good at telling the time based on the moons, or whatever it is that people actually use. You could check your palmtop, but given that you’re likely to drop it and then fry it, you’re more inclined to go with your gut feeling of ‘go home and spend the rest of the day waiting for the cerulean shoe to drop.’ It’s not a pleasant gut feeling, but it’s what you have to work with.

Your palmtop chimes and you decelerate, annoyed. If it’s Karkat, you are going to strangle him, no matter how much you like him.

There’s an old message from Eridan that was probably sent as you were walking out of Karkat’s hive, seriously? You ignore it and skip to AA’s alert, which is still flashing.

\-- apocalypseArisen [AA] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   
AA: not to be a downer   
AA: but how were we going to deal with me being half robot while moulting   
AA: its becoming extremely relevant   
AA: and also really itchy so if youre going to tell me i cant scratch im going to be really annoyed   
TA: fuck fuck fuck FUCK   
AA: i dont think that will help!   
TA: can you 2tiill fly   
AA: do i have two wash off the sopor first   
TA: no   
TA: get to eq2   
TA: iill meet you there   
TA: dont 2cratch or youll get an infectiion and melt   
AA: im definitely scratching   
\-- apocalypseArisen [AA] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --

You change courses without a thought and shoot off towards Equius’ hive. Vriska is going to have to wait, whether she likes it or not.


	8. Chapter 8

You barrel through Equius’ door without waiting, this time. Aurthour makes a distressed noise as you streak past him, half running and half propelling yourself with psionics. Your feet touch the ground only to kickstart your forward momentum, and it’s on one of these steps that a flare of green crashes into you and brings you down.  You snarl and shove back only to have you arms pinned firmly to the floor, and it’s only then that you realise your anchor is Nepeta.

“Pawlux?” she says, about as surprised as you are. It occurs to you, in that moment, that it probably would have been a good idea to message _Equius_ as well. There are claws at your throat and you probably wouldn’t be able to get out from under the ball of muscle that is Nepeta Leijon without psionics.

“AA’s not here yet?” you say, weakly.

The confusion in Nepeta’s eyes clears up a little, and she stands up, taking her claws away from your throat. You rub the spot where they were, checking to see if they broke your skin at all, as you sit up. You also underline Nepeta in your mental list of people you never want to tangle with.

She captchalogues her claws and offers you a hand up, which you take. “This is the furst I’ve heard about her coming. What happurrned?”

“She’s moulting,” you say, burning to get to the lab and start setting up so that you and Equius can start figuring out  how to handle AA’s body completely changing under your hands with a minimum of fuss. 

Something in Nepeta’s eyes softens and she steps aside. “I’ll find Equihiss and expurrlain to him fur you,” she says.

“You’re a lifesaver,” you tell her, and clatter down the stairs to the lab at breakneck speed, bouncing off the walls. You’re pretty sure you don’t actually touch the steps.

\--

Aradia’s first words to you are a heartfelt plea: “Sollux, if you don’t scratch my back, I’m going to _die_.” Equius looks away as you oblige her, busying himself with arranging the section of his lab the two of you managed to segregate and sterilise. 

“How are you feeling?” you ask, as she leans into your hands. 

She looks at you over her shoulder and raises an eyebrow.

“Other than itchy,” you amend.

She looks away again, pausing to consider. There’s a long silence, punctuated only by Equius’ clatter of tools, before she says, “Bony.”

“Bony,” you say.

“You asked,” she says, and steps away. “Hello, Equius.”

Now that she’s here, a fluttering feeling of panic rises in your chest and storms your throat. It wasn’t real before, but now you’re going to have to essentially perform emergency surgery and robotics on AA because you forgot that if KK had already moulted, AA had to moult soon. Prosthetics made for a pre-moult Aradia won’t fit a post-moult Aradia, and she’s half prosthetic.

If she dies on this table, it will be your fault.

Suddenly, warm hands are on your face. Aradia tilts your head until you meet her eyes – somehow, she can always tell – and she says, “Sollux, if my skin falls off because you are panicking, I am going to be so angry at you.”

You let out a slow breath and draw another. “If your skin falls off, we can finally replace it properly,” you say, and are rewarded with a smile. You press your forehead to hers, briefly, sparsely, before looking at Equius. “Are we ready?”

His look is so studiously blank, even behind his sunglasses, that for a moment you feel like you’ve seriously misread something and the floor has been yanked from under you. Then he clears his throat and moves into action, and the moment is past. He gestures to the table wordlessly and even helps Aradia up, though the help is unnecessary.  Finally, after a long, drawn-out moment, he says, haltingly, “You will be safe in my hive.”

She drops the hem of her shirt, and it occurs to you then how small Aradia is. She’s not breakable, or delicate, but next to Equius she is small and understrength, for all herself and her own muscles from digging, from corralling her lusus, from raiding tombs and hauling rocks and swinging from whips, for all she’s half-robot and only limited by the torque her parts can generate. She looks up at Equius, the threads of scarlet in her eyes catching the light, then finally smiles and pats him on the cheek. “I know,” she says.

Equius, having worn himself out with this statement, retreats back into the safe arms of procedure. You don’t blame him. “We will be keeping you under sedation for an extended period of time,” he says, stepping away to fiddle with the gas tanks until Aradia’s done stripping off her clothes. You fold them and put them in a small cubbyhole under one of the counters along the wall. “We will encourage the bioflesh to grow with you and cover your wounds until your moult is finished, and then I will craft new parts for you.”

“Exciting,” Aradia says, and fits the mask you hand her neatly over her nose and mouth before laying back. Her hair spills over the edges of the table and you gather it up and twist it into a loose braid, something you learned to do for her a long time ago. The smile she gives you is small and barely noticeable, just between the two of you, and you touch her shoulder lightly in return. Her skin, now that you can see it, is peeling in a lot of places; her elbow and knees at the moment, her stomach up to where the bioflesh knits with her own, around her grubleg nubs. The skin underneath is shiny and new, dark for now. It’ll fade to normal, if Karkat’s any indication. “When do I wake up?” she asks.

Equius looks at you.

You bite your lip. “We can wake you up when we’re done removing shit and the bioflesh has grown enough to encase all the wiring we’ll have to leave in you,” you say. “Or we can put you right under and you can sleep through moulting.”

Aradia pulls a face. “I don’t think I want to see what I look like without ribs.”

“It’s pretty gross,” you admit. “And you’ll be peeling.”

“ _Thank_ you,” she says, but squeezes your hand. “Can we get started before I scratch off my fingertips?”

“I’ll be here,” you say, and fill a needle with pentothal. 

\--

It’s mostly Equius’ show once Aradia is under. You cut away the bioflesh covering her metal ribs and then fulfil your duty as Arbiter of Screwdrivers for the most part, while Equius carefully detaches first Aradia’s arm and its fitting, and then begins to carefully dismantle her torso, removing the hydraulics that replace her muscles and the struts that keep her chest cavity in place. You wonder what he’ll do with it all, now that it’s essentially useless to Aradia.

The wiring is the problem. Together, you and Equius managed to replicate a respiratory system, a nervous system, a digestive system, a circulatory system, and basically Aradia is full of wires and needs a full upgrade. Most of her organs now are crude replicas of a living organ, filters and siphons and pumps, which means that they should be easy to replace, but the sad fact is that you are operating out of a basement and organ transplants are difficult even for two geniuses with a knack for improvisation.

Equius wipes his forehead absently with a towel you doubt he even notices he has. “Perhaps we should simply enclose the wiring now to prevent infection,” he says, staring at Aradia like she is a particularly difficult puzzle and the pieces aren’t coming together.  “Replacing the systems will be much easier when a chassis is put in place.”

“What if moulting puts too much stress on her system?” you ask. “Yeah, she’s in a coma, but she’s going to be burning through a lot of energy and going through some rapid change.”

“We can add temporary measures, if necessary.” Equius carefully pries through the mess of tubes and paths that is Aradia, and a wave of nausea washes over you. You grip the table and breathe until it passes; Aradia is more than this web of blood, a body is a shell, and you need to fix hers. “It would behoove us to trim back the nervous system,” he says, after a long moment. He either didn’t notice your moment or is ignoring it. You’re fine with both those possibilities. “The sensors will need to be replaced, and there is the potential for the nerves you fabricated to interpret the signals from her brain incorrectly.”

You swallow again. The nervous system you created is based on what you could pull together from procedures of converting Helmsmen.  Interpreting wrongly, indeed; when Helmsmen nerves get a growth signal, it’s either because they’ve just been implanted in a ship, or because the ship has been extensively remodeled.  In either case, their ‘nerves’ are instructed to spread through the ship; in Aradia’s case, she’d probably try to grow over and into Equius’ lab. For all that they civilly resolved their differences, you doubt Equius wants a sentient Aradia!lab.

“Will her organs still work?” you ask, already detaching the sensors from the bioflesh usually covered by Aradia’s plating. The nerves, a fine, near-invisible web that you have to carefully tug free of each sensor, pool at the bottom of her torso. “If they don’t get signals-”

“The systems are independent,” Equius says. “They run according to the rest of her body.” He picks up a scalpel, but you wave him down and focus your psionics until you can feel the sluggish impulses in Aradia’s body. The homegrown nerves stand out, made to easily detach and reattach, and you slice them through neatly. Deep in her coma, Aradia’s body fails to notice, and continues not going into shock, which is excellent for all involved.

\--

Equius stitches the bioflesh closed around the jumble of tubing with small, neat lines. It’s enough for now, but in the hours you’ve been working, Aradia’s skin has started peeling away in larger pieces and you swear she’s grown a little besides. You press at the base of one of her horns curiously; it’s engorged, and the newest deep orange chitin still gives a little when you press it. Even slowing down her metabolism hasn’t been enough to keep her unchanged while you work.

“She needs sopor,” you say, and pick at the dry, flaking-away skin of her arm. The very edges look sore and inflamed. “Antibiotics first, then sopor.”

“I asked Nepeta to purchase additional sopor before we began,” Equius says, and strips off his gloves after tying off the suture. He uses a method you haven’t seen before, a stitch that locks itself instead of having to be tied off after every suture, and you can admire the simplicity of it. You do so deliberately, in fact, to try to keep your mind off how Aradia is suddenly down half a torso and only alive by the grace of the heart and lungs she’s outgrowing. “I will go fetch it,” he says, and you jerk yourself back into the present again.

“Yeah,” you say, lamely, then dig up the antibiotic gel. Applying it to Aradia is kind of awkward, mostly because you’re pretty sure she’d laugh at you if she was awake. You’re halfway to tired, hysteric snickering by the time Equius steps in with a small container of sopor. He steps out again when you take it from him, leaving you to care for your moirail in peace. As far as you can, you appreciate that.

You coat Aradia with the sopor as well, hoping that it’ll at least... do something. Make her grow slowly enough that you can keep up. Make her comfortable. Stop her skin from splitting and peeling off, which is pretty much the last thing you needed to see, ever. Somehow, thin layers of skin peeling away under your hands are so much more viscerally disturbing than actually operating on her.

You wish KK wasn’t knee-deep in his own shit. The one time you could actually use him, and he turns out to be the reincarnation of some long-dead hero. For all you care at the moment, the Empire can go rot to the core unless it wants to help Aradia out.

When you’re done, you collapse into a seat on the floor, too worn-out to find a chair. Plus the stupid thing would probably just introduce foreign germs and kill AA, so floor it is. You strip off your gloves before reaching up and taking AA’s hand, which is still warm despite everything, and lean against the workslab.

You wish you were anyone else right now.

\--

After the first hour of you sitting on the floor and staring vacantly into the air, Equius comes into the curtained-off area that is AA’s medbay and makes some rumbly noises that you don’t bother to parse. You think you have this disconnect going well, really. It’ll be good practice for when you’re strung up in a helmsblock and everyone is dead. The only problem with it is the uncomfortable nagging in this state that there’s no reason to keep AA alive, if everybody is going to be dead. You ignore it, like you do with every other intrusive thought you don’t like.

After a longer time, Equius comes back in and sits across from you, uncomfortably. He’s not really made for sitting cross-legged on the floor. Underneath his arm is a flattened roll of paper, which he unrolls in front of you.

You look down at it.

It takes a moment to process. He’s taken the rough schema you and he built for AA and extrapolated it into a Helmsman rig, but it’s _wrong_ , unlike any of the schematics you’ve come across. And you’ve come across many; some bad, some less bad. This is...

You hold out a hand, the first thing you’ve really done since your clockwork stopped ticking after you’d finished with AA. Equius gives you a pen, which is fine, because you don’t make errors.

“This is wrong,” you say, circling the spinal tap where it connects with the Helmsman. “It won’t reach the spinal column properly, and you’ve made a fucking mess of the nerve grafts...”  You frown as you follow the line of the arm. The biowires feed into ports in the Helmsman’s arms, rather than following the traditional just-shove-it-all-together approach favoured by Her Condescension’s Imperial scienterrorists. “All this is deliberate?” you ask. Now that you look at it, the spinal tap _could_ work, if this is what you think it’s meant to be.

Equius inclines his head. “If you’re dismissing the idea’s feasibility, I would point out that we have already accomplished much the same with Aradia’s arm.”

You shove your glasses further up your nose and lean closer to the blueprint spread over the floor. It’s basic - no one blueprint could ever show all that goes into the making of a Helmsman - but it’s a way of doing things that you have _never_ seen. And that intrigues you.

You make adjustments anyway, scrawling in red over the page, realigning the ports to better fit with the structural reinforcements that Helmsmen go through. Some you split, some you combine. The only thing you don’t adjust is the pair of goggles that claws its way into every Helmsman, which of course Equius picks up on.

“Why-” he manages to get out, before you slash a hand through the air to cut him off.

One day you’re going to learn to not treat highbloods like you would KK.

“Do you know what causes psionic power?” you ask, not looking at him as you give the blueprint a final scan.

“I-” he says, before stopping. Subdued, he continues, “Something to do with the genetic differences between lowbloods and highbloods, I suppose.”

You shake your head. “Highbloods get lucky too, sometimes. It’s rare, but it happens.” As you think, you smooth your hands over the paper, blurring the ink that’s still wet a little and smearing red all over your hands. You couldn’t give less of a fuck. “The Empire keeps it secret and we don’t have the shit to research it planet-side,” you say. “But it’s something in the brain. And the fastest way to the brain...”

“...is through the eyes,” Equius finishes. There’s something more pallid about him than usual. You guess that for all he’s helped you out with Aradia, he’s never confronted the reality behind Helming. The Empire is efficient, not humane, and a psionic is a tool. You have no sympathy for him coming to the realisation that the hemospectrum exists to torture you, not to give you a place. Even if you’re a highblood. 

“This is useless,” you say, a chill in your voice that you didn’t expect. “It would be more expensive and a timesink to implement.” Your hands curl into fists around the page, but instead of ripping it like you expected to, you just shake instead. “The Empire will never...”

_ Feferi _ , you think, from a distance. _Feferi and AA._

“The difference in quality of life would be worth exploring,” Equius says, calmly removing the paper from your hands. He always does everything calmly, deliberately, except when he’s working out his frustrations on the robots he builds. He wasn’t so controlled when you were all five or six and he was crushing hard on Aradia, but you guess it’s something he’s had to learn. For what reason, you can’t fathom; it’s not like he’d be in danger unless he suckerpunched Eridan or Feferi.

Fucking highbloods. Everything they do, they have to _meddle_. You get why Kanaya and Terezi are going along with KK, and a part of you is relieved they are, but it’s not exactly like they _asked_ him. You’re caught in fucking blueblood games, Vriska jerking your strings and Equius doing his best to pretend you don’t have them so he feels less existential guilt. You’re half-convinced Eridan is scoping you out as a ship and you don’t even care since it means there’s at least one highblood you can bite back at without feeling bad. And as much as you appreciate what Feferi’s trying to do, you kind of wish it didn’t involve you so much. Or KK. Or AA, for all that it’s her best chance at safety. Tavros has the right idea, flatly minimising his contact with any and all highbloods.

Since Equius is very carefully not looking at you, you let your head droop into your hands. You were never this tired before you agreed to revolution, you’re sure. And since you can’t just say, ‘quit it,’ to a blueblood who spars with robots, you’re going to have to tone down your natural abrasion a little.

“Why are you doing this?” you ask, your voice sounding a little more hollow and a little less sharp than you intended.

Equius rolls up the blueprint, his expression flat, which you’ve come to realise is his thoughtful expression. He taps the rolled paper on the floor to even it out before saying, “If you are going to regard yourself as a tool, I cannot stop you. To a certain extent, I would agree.” His brows draw together, and behind his sunglasses you can just barely make out that he’s avoiding meeting your eyes. “There is a difference between a lathe and a psionic, however.”

He thrusts the rolled-up blueprint at you, and you take it reflexively. It feels heavy in your hands, another responsibility you never asked for and don’t want. With a brief, jerky nod in your general direction, Equius stands and leaves.

You never expected _Equius_ to be an idealist. Now you’ve gone and tripped his fucked-up sense of duty and The Care and Feeding of Your Psionic is going to be his next project, fit in-between punching robots to death and glaring at Gamzee for not being a shining example of juggalo fuckery. 

You fall back against the floor and hold the blueprint above you with your psionics. A detachable rig _would_ be a leap forward. Maybe on smaller ships, supply runs and personal vessels. There’s no way the Empire would ever risk it on a battleship, though.

\--

You don’t doze off, exactly, but you’re not at your best when a shadow blocks out the harsh, fluorescent lighting of Equius’ labs and startles you out of your comforting static-hiss distraction. At first you think it’s Nepeta, sheerly by dint of it not being Equius, but when you look up you see cerulean.

Your reaction is immediate. You spring up and throw her back through the air, tearing the curtain separating AA from the rest of the lab down and knocking Vriska against a table full of glassware, pinning her down out of sheer desperation and certainty she’s come for revenge, because Vriska Serket always comes for revenge.

The glassware crashes to the floor as the table rocks with the force of Vriska’s impact, and only when the last piece is done shattering does Vriska shake her hair out of her face and roll her eyes.

“The fuck do you want?” you snarl, pressing the advantage while you have it. Your psionics press her harder into the edge of the table, hard enough that you see her grit her teeth before her usual need for performance takes over again.

“Uh, to get down?” Vriska says, wriggling her shoulders. “Jeez, Sol, can’t a girl visit her neighbour?” You feel - no - you feel your psionics dissipate as you let - _no_ \- them go, dropping Vriska to her feet. She walks up to you and pats your cheek. “Now, I’m going to let you go, and you’re going to remember that murdering someone in someone else’s house is a _big_ no-no in highblood society, okay? Just nod.”

She makes you nod, loose and exaggerated, and you feel sick, helpless rage flare up in you.

“Attaboy,” she says, and wanders past you to Aradia’s side. The hooks in your head vanish, leaving you reeling and bereft for a moment. You stagger two steps before finding equilibrium and rushing after her.

The look on her face draws you up short. It’s not regretful, exactly, as she looks at Aradia, gas-masked and war-torn, but she does look sad. You don’t think you’ve ever seen Vriska displaying an emotion other than petulant before.

“Got your message,” she says, not looking away from Aradia. Your fingers curl into claws by themselves and you barely repress a snarl. Annoyance tinges Vriska’s voice as she hooks into your brain hard and floods it with relaxation. “I’m not going to hurt your moirail, Captor, so simmer the fuck down.”

You fight to hold onto your rage, but the best you can manage in the face of Vriska’s manipulation in weariness. “I told you to stay away from us.”

“We had a deal.” Vriska finally turns away from Aradia, a snap-fluid movement that flicks her hair over her shoulders. Her one eye is still completely grey, you notice. “But, hey, I understand your reservations!” she says, all false cheer and camaraderie. “It sure looks like I want a ship! So I thought I’d clear things up for you a little.”

“Enlighten me,” you say, still fighting off the effects of being forcibly sedated. It makes you sound dead, and part of you is screaming at yourself to at least stop sounding like such an easy mark. Aradia continues sleeping, unknowing, the rise and fall of her chest the only thing that shows she’s still alive. You hope that the myth of people remembering things from when they’re under is false, for her sake.

“I don’t want a ship,” Vriska says, with the patient tones of a jadeblood. “All the ones around are old and useless anyway! They’d break to pieces in orbit.” She uses her hands to illustrate, adding a condescending, “pchoooooooo!”

“Thanks for that,” you say.

“No problem.” She turns back to Aradia and your palms itch with the need to tear her away, but your best bet for getting rid of her is just to hear her out. “So I don’t want a crappy ship, alright? Not to mention that Megido ain’t exactly in piloting shape right now.” Her lips tug downward briefly enough that you think you might have imagined it. “Scrap metal’s worth a lot here. Every greenblood bitch with a penchant for tinkering wants metal and Alternia’s mined out. Fleet needs their metal, so we get exactly shit-all and I-”

You cross your arms and refuse to play into her theatrics.

“-I want the money,” she finishes, a little sulkily since you didn’t chime in with a breathy, ‘you what?’ “Capische, Captor? Nobody’s batterying either of you poor fucks yet.”

“Fine,” you say, curtly. “I’ll find your metal.”

Vriska holds out her metal arm and wriggles her fingers. “Shake on it?”

\--

Equius takes Vriska somewhere else to work on her eye - the reason she gives for her visit, and you don’t actually doubt it since she had no way of knowing you were here to pick on - and you are actually grateful for his intervention. Since Vriska has probably thoroughly contaminated your sterile area, you drag a barebones metal-and-plastic chair in before scouring everything down with bleach and psionics. The slight sound of AA’s breathing is all you can hear and soothes your ruffled edges from Vriska’s influence as you clean.

Later, when you’re sitting by Aradia’s side and rubbing your thumb over the back of her hand as you think, Equius lifts aside the remaining curtain around AA’s space, but doesn’t step within its bounds. You raise your eyebrows and wait for him to spit it out, too done with this night to bother with using your words.

“Nepeta has...” he says, before shaking his head. “I require you to eat the portion of meat Nepeta insists is mine.”

“NP?” you echo in confusion. Nepeta’s cool, sure, but you’re not exactly sharing-a-meal-buddies with anyone in this hive. Your brain catches up with the conversation, and you say, awkwardly, “I mean, I should stay with AA-” You pause to let your brain catch up _again_ and say, dubiously, “It’s _not_ yours?”

“I do not eat meat,” Equius says, frostily. You guess it’s part of his weird hoofbeast thing. At your look, he shifts awkwardly and adds, “She is using this to ensure you eat with us. You will eat.”

 “Or what?” you snap, your brain clearly put in neutral and left to spin its wheels again. 

Equius is clearly surprised, but perhaps he’s learning to deal with you. His eyebrows - the most expressive part of his face, with his sunglasses blocking his eyes - only rise a little before he resumes his usual stoic expression. “Or you will keel over on your moirail and ruin my stitching,” he says. And you can’t exactly argue with that.

You carefully place AA’s hand on her stomach before standing up and stretching out. “Can the door be locked?” you ask, not looking at Equius. You’re learning to read his silences, a little, but the one that spins out from your question is one you haven’t encountered before.

“I apologise for Vriska’s intrusion,” he says, and when you look at him he actually looks it. “The door will be locked. She will not cause any more harm to Aradia due to my laxity.”

“Then I’ll come eat,” you say, and let Equius escort you out.


	9. Chapter 9

The bioflesh stretches with AA as she grows, but not enough. Her own skin rips apart and peels away and generates anew thanks to the hormones flooding her body and the calories you and Equius are pumping into her, but the bioflesh has no such response. When you wake up to the taste of not enough sopor and too many daymares coating your mouth, the bioflesh is already stretched taut height-wise, the stitches digging into her in a way that makes you uncomfortable just to look at.

You feel her forehead – only the highest of tech for you – and are unsurprised when she’s uncomfortably feverish under your hand. A lot of work goes into building up an adult body. Still, she can probably deal with the stressor of the fever or the stressor of the bioflesh not growing with her, not both at once. At least you still have more time to prepare than ‘none, actually, be ready two nights ago.’

You wish you could wake her up to talk to her. When you put her under you were too busy thinking about the risks that she’d just stop breathing to think about the risk of you missing your moirail like you’re six sweeps old, but now with her burning away under your hand you need her more than you realised. You need to tell her about Vriska and talk about Feferi’s plans and get your own archaeology liveblogs as you code, to go back to your lives and forget this shit ever happened.

Ever since Vriska waltzed in, you’ve been keeping the door locked, without access to the key because it would be incredibly pointless if Vriska could just squint and make you open the door. Equius must still be asleep or he’d be in here with you, working on the parts of Aradia’s new prosthetics that don’t need to be sized to fit. You feel kind of shitty about making him keep your hours and abandon his own projects, but you’re going to need his help for working through this stage of Aradia’s progress. Even if you didn’t, you’d still want a second pair of eyes anyway. So, feeling immensely regretful over your life choices, you keep one hand on Aradia in case she can feel it and pull out your palmtop with the other.

Huh. You’d forgotten about those unread messages.

\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has started trolling centaursTesticle [CT] --  
TA: calamiitou2  
TA: and now that we know vk ii2n’t controlliing me aa’2 growth rate ha2 2hot up and the biiofle2h ii2n’t keepiing up  
TA: al2o ii would really liike the opportuniity two pii22  
TA: or whatever iit ii2 blueblood2 2ay  
CT: :33 < *ac will come let pawlux out of his cage*  
TA: np?  
TA: ii2 there any poiint two me iin2ii2tiing you wake eq up now or ii2 thii2 goiing two be a conver2atiion  
CT: >:33 < its defurnitely a confursation  
TA: fuck  
CT is an idle troll!  
\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has ceased trolling centaursTesticle [CT] --

Now Nepeta is going to yell at you about overworking her moirail and you are going to feel guilty and everything will be terrible forever. This night is shaping up to be not fun.

You might as well check the rest of your messages and get all the bad news out of the way.

\-- caligulasAquarium [CA] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --  
CA: sol  
CA: sol wwould you fuckin go offline or set to idle if you aint gonna answwer  
CA: I don’t evven knoww if this is your idea a bein a good kismesis or if youre just this legitimately fuckin annoyin  
CA: but if you wwere wwonderin its leanin towwards the latter  
CA: just fuckin talk to me wwhen you see this  
CA is an idle troll!  
TA: why can’t iit be both  
TA: al2o what ii2 iit  
TA: kiind of bu2y wiith aa 2o keep the biitchiing two a miiniimum  
CA has returned!  
CA: wwhat still  
TA: yeah ii don’t know iif you notiiced but metal’2 not really known for iit2 growth capabiiliitiies  
CA: is she alright  
TA: what  
CA: wwell is she dyin or wwhat  
TA: who are you  
CA: wwere goin to see fef so if ray is goin to die itd be a good thing to knoww beforehand  
CA: im pretty sure that you an eq can keep ray alive until fef can get there  
TA: what ii2 happeniing  
CA: its a simple fuckin question sol  
TA: why do you care  
CA: howw many times do i havve to fuckin say it  
CA: not carin about things is your problem  
CA: quit makin it mine  
CA: an if you tell ray this i wwill straight up slit your throat an feed you to glbgolyb but she aint a terrible abhistorian  
TA: eiither 2hackiing up wiith kk ha2 been good for you or you have gone entiirely iin2ane  
CA: can wwe havve the eri youre a casteist wwho wwants to kill all landdwwellers talk another time  
CA: wwere leavvin soon  
CA: yes or no on tellin fef that ray needs help  
TA: iit 2hould be fiine not two  
TA: eq and ii have iit under control  
TA: keep me apprii2ed   
CA: wwhatevver  
\-- caligulasAquarium [CA] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --

Nepeta backs into the lab as you’re slipping your palmtop back into your pocket, a plate of toasted grubloaf in one hand and a glass of water in the other, and you feel guilty about thinking grumbly thoughts about her. Anyone who brings you food is a national hero, as far as you’re concerned. You promptly shove a slice of grubloaf in your mouth so that you won’t be able to say anything implicating and mumble a, “Fanksh,” around it.

“Equihiss would be mad if you fell over,” she says, and hoists herself up onto one of the benches to sit. It encapsulates your relationship well, you think. You’re only connected by her moirail, tenuous at best, but you’re close enough on the spectrum that she doesn’t trigger your suicide-by-mouthing-off tendencies.

You wonder if that’s why Equius is so unwilling to harm you. Nepeta’s a bare step above you, and doing anything to you would inevitably reflect on her as well.

“Do you like my meowrail?” she asks, and you choke on your grubloaf. She thumps you on the back, utterly unrepentant about breaking your spine in the process.

“He’s good to work with,” you hazard, once you’re done sounding asthmatic. For as much as you have been working with Equius, you haven’t really been _thinking_ about him. He’s just the tall sweaty guy who hands you the soldering wire and perspires whenever you do something _lewd_ , like swearing when you accidentally solder yourself to something. To be fair, he’s a lot better to work with than KK. You always get the right tool and don’t have to explain everything six times over. And despite seeing Aradia as a project, he’s still given her good care. The same as you’d expect him to give Vriska, really.

You just wish he’d drop his Save the Psionics campaign.

You shrug as cagily as you can. “Yeah.” When you see her face, you add hastily, “Fuck, NP, no, I mean as a _work_ partner. _Work_.”

She wraps her arms around you and squeezes, and you’re going to have to bulk up if you’re going to keep associating with these two. “That’s fine, that’s compurrletely fine!” she says, bouncing on the balls of her feet, and you are officially a terrible person for thinking about her rumble spheres. “There’s just - I love him, I can pawcify him, but we’re not _furends_ like you and him, I don’t care about his dumb robots and he hates my hunting, and ever since Gamzee went all _weird_ he hasn’t really talked to _anyone-_ ”

You manage to pry off her hands. “NP, I don’t,” you start, helplessly. This is one of the very few times you have ever wished you were KK, because at least KK knows how to handle shit like this. In theory, anyway. “I’m only here because of AA,” you say, miserable. You want your moirail.

Nepeta frowns. “So think of something else once this is done.”

“NP,” you say again, hollowly. N-P, no problem, you fucking wish. You hop up onto the bench she was sitting on and use the time to compose yourself. It doesn’t work. “He’s a casteist fuck who thinks I belong in a helmsblock and should be grateful for it,” you say, and stare at your hands. “I haven’t even told him about the shit I’m working on for FF. He doesn’t even know about KK. How do you think he’s going to feel when he realises just what you were crushing on all those sweeps?”

Nepeta is silent, before saying, “That was low.”

“Yeah, well,” you say. Now you have a headache and you haven’t even started fixing AA’s imminent shredding difficulty. This night is not going as planned. “I feel pretty fucking low, but this isn’t my problem.”

“You said you were working for Fefurry.” Nepeta drums her heels against one of the bench’s legs, making quiet _dun-duhnk_ sounds that are almost soothing, if you don’t think too hard about it. “She’s putting up a serious catfight for Empurress?”

You close your eyes and listen to the thuds. Pressure is slowly but surely building up in your head, and you know from long experience that this is going to lead to an episode. You need to take care of AA before it escalates that far and you start hearing voices, and preferably you need to lie down and stay very still while that happens, but first this needs to be done. You grit your teeth and focus on that. One step at a time.

“Already making plans for the Empire,” you say. “Look, NP, I really do need EQ’s help. Like, within the next fifteen minutes. Spit it out.”

“Fine,” she says, and stretches. Her arm cracks and it echoes through your skull messily, making you wince. “Fefurry’s going to knead advisors, and that includes sweaty casteist fucks like Equihiss, because you can bet that there are lot more of them then there are of Karkitty.”

You let your shoulders sag in defeat, because she makes a good point and you don’t want to acknowledge it. “Fine,” you agree, reluctantly. “But I run the schedule of when to introduce him to all the facts.”

“Whatev _purr_ ,” she says, dismissively. “It’s your thing, not mine.” She leans in close to you, resting her head on your shoulder in a gross imitation of pale behaviour, and says, “If you break him, I break you!”

“I feel broken already,” you say, and refuse to be consoled by her patting you on the shoulder before she slides off the bench and skips out of the room. Then you realise, with a feeling that makes your previous sinking feeling look like a piece of sheet ice bobbing on the waves, what this means. You’re going to need a pretext to keep working with Equius once Aradia’s done moulting, and now that you’re done with KK’s ident you don’t have any other projects that would need his equipment.

You’re going to have to develop the psionic thing.

Fuck your life.

\--

Coaxing the skin to grow as quickly as you need it is nigh-impossible when it’s attached to Aradia and obeying signals from her brain that you don’t want to interrupt in case it leads to the dreaded sentient lab scenario, so you pull out the last of the synthetic spider-silk framework TZ swears _F3LL OFF TH3 B4CK OF 4 TRUCK_ , and that’s as far as you get before you’re slapped upside the pan with the memories of the last time you had to use it.

That was when everything stopped for you, you think. You’ve been in the same holding patterns ever since, of _protect AA hide KK keep your head down and do your own shit and the future will come, eventually_. Keeping AA alive that day is, in many ways, the last thing you remember doing, and ever since you’ve just been reacting.

“Sollux?” Equius says, dropping the scalpel he used to take a culture of AA’s bioflesh into the small autoclave on the bench next to you. It’s the first thing he’s said to you since the awkward, stilted discussion of why you needed his help; you think maybe he saw the chatlog and is worried about what his moirail may or may not have said to you.

“Why did you help AA?” you ask, before you realise what a stupid question it was. “Fuck, no, sorry, it was FF, obviously.”

Equius rips off his gloves - literally, he can’t actually take them off without destroying them and it’s fifty-fifty as to whether he manages to get them on, sometimes - and tosses them into the waste receptacle. “It was Ampora who asked me,” he says, and your stomach drops to your shoes, because you don’t like this prior evidence of Eridan having a stake in Aradia’s wellbeing. To be fair, Feferi didn’t really have a chance, since she was practically glued to Aradia to keep your moirail breathing. You hadn’t realised it was Eridan, though.

“I had more reasons than duty,” he says, cutting through your unease. “I was still... enamoured with her, and foal- _foolishly_ , I thought that her gratefulness would lead to her favour.” He refuses to look at you, his hair a curtain between the two of you. Which is good, because you’d probably have to try to punch him on principle and you’d break your fingers before it actually did anything. “There was also the fact that it was a unique challenge, requiring my particular skillset.”

You have to fight against the wash of - terror? anger? - that floods you. All you remember feeling is the helplessness of not having enough hands to cover all the bleeding, the horror of your moirail’s husk burning away in front of you and the knowledge that if you didn’t move fast enough, you’d slip into Vriska’s clutches again and finish the job.

You’ve spent a long time locked in that moment.

“Ampora appealed to me, though he didn’t have to,” Equius adds, almost idly, and you nearly drop the silk framework. He finds a jar of the enzymes used to break down the bioflesh to its fibroblasts in the small lab fridge as he talks, still not looking at you. “He asked me to imagine Nepeta in the same situation.”

Despite yourself, you whistle through your many teeth. “And you didn’t break his face?”

“I may have bruised him slightly,” Equius admits. “It did assure my compliance, however.”

You’re not sure if this is his way of broaching the subject of Nepeta with you or if he’s trying to reassure you that Aradia’s in safe hands. Ironically, you feel a little less mechanistic now that you know he’s treating AA the same way he would his own moirail. More like you’re working on a problem than the detached, overwhelming panic that roars in your ears from time to time, echoes of the first time you did this, running on bootleg supplies and old research.

“Thanks,” you say, abrupt and awkward, and then you quit having feelings and rig together a frame for the silk instead. You can feel the edges of the impeding headache shrinking in, and you’re still going to have to flood these fibroblasts with psi in order to make the bioflesh grow quickly enough to be useful. She’s already gotten so much taller and broader that you’re not sure the frame’s going to be big enough.

\--

Even though you can’t currently stand, or open more than one eye at once, and you’re seriously considering ditching breathing if it continues to make you miserable, you insist on staying awake and spilled into your chair while Equius grafts the new bioflesh onto AA. For whatever reason you aren’t getting overwhelmed with the voices, which is a blessing come overdue, but that doesn’t stop the fact that you want to take an eye out and maybe a few teeth while you’re at it. You don’t know if you’ll even be able to get to sleep to ride it out like you usually do, which is a concept you’re not entirely happy with, when you can concentrate on it.

“The grafts are taking well,” Equius says, an indistinct shape on the other side of AA with a fancy medical staplegun in hand. He takes a scalpel and makes some short cuts into the new flesh, and already some indistinct byproduct of bioflesh seeps out. You flail at the cart beside you until your gloves hand comes in contact with the tub of antibiotic gunk and hand it over, certain that this will be your major contribution to this part of the operation. You think that’s fair, given that you essentially just drained yourself giving fake skin enough energy to grow enough that you could have reskinned AA entirely, if necessary. “I am capable of the rest of the operation,” he says, and even if you are swaying in your chair you know condescension when you hear it.

“’S’good,” you say, distantly.

Your partner in inadvisable cyborg surgery finishes up in silence, covering the new skin in a light layer of gauze to catch all the crud that will inevitably leak out of it while it assimilates to AA’s body.  You take the opportunity to droop lower and lower in your chair, your eyelids following suit.

“Sollux?” Equius says, some time later.

You make a noise of acknowledgement, which is about all you can manage. Next thing you know, there is a cool hand on your head, placed there with extreme care. You try to not groan at the relief and fail miserably. “You don’t appear to be running a fever,” Equius says, more uncertain than he’s ever been while operating on Aradia. “I wouldn’t be sure. Do we need to remove you from the room?”

“’S a migraine,” you slur. “Not gonna kill AA. Already fucked that one up.” There’s a long silence, punctuated by Equius taking his hand away, as if he forgot it was there. “Turn off the lights, EQ.”

A switch clicks and you can feel the difference as the workshop lights stop hammering through your eyelids and into your skull. It’s at this point that your brain gives up on you in disgust and fucks off to the land of unconsciousness. You’re not sure when exactly you fall asleep, but at some point everything becomes slightly less awful, and you drift away on the smell of antiseptic and motor oil.

\--

You come back to yourself about halfway through the night, the migraine turned back into a plain headache, which you can handle. AA is stable in front of you, wrapped in gauze that softens the shapelessness of her torso, the un-cyborg side of her chest rising and falling in time with the sounds of the oxygen machine. Her braid has come loose, probably when Equius had to move her to attach the grafts properly. You do it up again with clumsy fingers, four strands instead of three now that AA’s not awake to laugh at you for it.

You can hear Equius in the robotics part of the lab, clanking around faintly. You’re not ready for that conversation, so you pull out your palmtop instead and check to see if Eridan has actually kept you apprised. He hasn’t, but Karkat’s handle is flashing, so you open it expecting a screed.

\-- carcinoGeneticist [CG] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --  
CG: SO.  
CG: I’M NOW MOIRAILED TO THE FUTURE EMPRESS.  
CG: HOW’S YOUR NIGHT BEEN?  
TA is an idle troll!  
\-- carcinoGeneticist [CG] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --

You scrub your face with your hand, reread the message, and reflect that you will never be awake enough for this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The method of growing skin is [actually a thing](http://news.discovery.com/tech/artificial-skin-spider-silk-110810.htm)! SCIENCE.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't forget to click on the picture Karkat sends in order to see it in artistic glory, thanks to [Choco](http://www.jekunchocobo.tumblr.com). 
> 
> (Also, it is my birthday! Happy my birthday, readers <3\. From now on, OLOH will be keeping a fortnightly update schedule; 4:30am Thursdays AEST at [my Tumblr](http://www.ashkatom.tumblr.com) and whenever I wake up and crosspost it over for here.)

\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has started trolling carcinoGeneticist [CG] --  
TA: liike fuck you are  
CG: INDEED LIKE FUCK WE ARE. MUCH LIKE FUCKING, IT IS INEVITABLE AND ORDAINED FROM ON HIGH.  
CG is sending file ‘[PICSBECAUSEITTOTALLYHAPPENED.png](https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/28844310/Tumblr/Fic/PICSBECAUSEITTOTALLYHAPPENED.png)’  
CG: DO I NEED TO GET MY VESTIGIAL THORACIC SACS OUT OR IS YOUR DISDAINFUL NERD SHTICK SATISFIED?  
TA: no need two 2car me for liife kk  
TA: what the fuck ii2 that riing even  
CG: RHODOLITE GARNET. SHE’S GOT A RUBY, BECAUSE APPARENTLY WHEN YOU’RE ROYAL YOU CAN JUST PULL PRECIOUS STONES OUT OF YOUR ASS IN THE EVENT OF GETTING YOUR VERY OWN MUTANTBLOODED MOIRAIL.  
TA: 2o when2 the hand2fa2tiing  
CG: RIGHT ABOUT THE TIME SHIT STOPS SPEWING FROM YOUR MOUTH AND PRETENDING TO BE AN INFORMED OPINION. WHAT HAPPENED, DID A DAYWALKER BITE YOU AND INITIATE THE DECAY TO TWO BRAIN CELLS THAT WE ALL KNEW WAS COMING?  
TA: ouch  
TA: 2orry kk ii 2hould have known iit wa2 2erendiipiity  
CG: NEVER DOUBT THE MARCH OF FATE, SHITSPONGE.  
CG: I HAVE ALSO BEEN GIVEN COMPLETE ACCESS TO HER CREDIT ACCOUNT AND NEAR-TOTAL PERMISSION TO ‘FUCK EVERYFIN UP!’  
CG: DID YOU KNOW FEFERI IS TERRIFYING?  
CG: DID YOU KNOW THAT WHEN I MENTIONED THAT, SHE STARTED GIGGLING AND SAID ‘FEFERIFYING’?  
TA: you are 2o iin over your head  
CG: LET US ALL INDULGE IN A PRAYER OF THANKS THAT I AM INDISPENSIBLE TO THE PART OF OUR INCLADE WITH GILLS.  
CG: SPEAKING OF WHICH, ERIDAN TOLD ME ABOUT ARADIA STILL BEING BUSY WITH MOULTING. FOR ONCE IN YOUR MISERABLE LIFE, BE STRAIGHT WITH ME: IS SHE DOING OKAY?  
TA: fiine  
TA: peeliing a lot  
TA: 2uddenly taller than me  
TA: ii thiink iit2 fiinally taperiing off 2o we can replace the 2hiit that need2 replaciing and wake her up agaiin  
TA: fear not kk 2oon you wiill be able two offload all thii2 choiice go22iip on 2omeone who actually appreciiate2 it  
CG: THE SOONER, THE BETTER. YOUR COMPLETE DISREGARD FOR MY ROMANTIC LIFE IS INSULTING, FRANKLY.  
CG: YOU’RE NOT GLOSSING OVER SHIT TO MAKE IT SOUND BETTER OR ANYTHING, ARE YOU?  
CG: I DON’T MEAN TO BRAG, BUT I DO KIND OF HAVE AN IN WITH THE HEIRESS. PRETTY SURE I COULD GET HER TO DO YOU A SOLID.  
TA: holy fuck kk iif you dont 2top worryiing your pan ii2 goiing two eat iit2elf  
TA: eq and ii have iit under control  
TA: go do your revolutiion 2hiit and hiit ed for not keepiing me updated  
CG: ABOUT THAT. MY ENTOURAGE AND I ARE LEAVING AT DUSK TOMORROW.  
TA: whoa hold up  
TA: ii dont thiink iim ready for you two leave the ne2t  
TA: where are you goiing  
TA: how long are you goiing two be there  
TA: who are you goiing two contact in an emergency  
CG: NEXT TIME I’M JUST GOING TO MESSAGE ARADIA AND LET HER RELAY THIS INFORMATION TO YOU AT HER LEISURE WHILE YOU DROWN IN YOUR OWN TEARS OF LONELINESS AND DESPAIR. IF I AM GOING TO REACH THE PUBLIC, I WILL HAVE TO BE LOCATED AT LEAST TANGENTIALLY NEARBY SAID PUBLIC.  
CG: I HAVE A FAVOUR TO ASK.  
TA: a2k iit  
CG: CAN YOU KEEP AN EYE ON CRABDAD FOR ME?  
CG: IF YOU WANT TO MOVE OVER TO MY PLACE FOR A WHILE YOU MIGHT AS WELL.  
TA: kk no  
TA: ii liike my hiive2tem  
TA: what would ii even do wiith a hiive  
CG: FUCKING HIVESIT IT FOR THE ONLY FRIEND OF YOURS WHO PUTS UP WITH ALL YOUR SHIT?  
CG: DO NOT EVEN TRY TO FRONT THAT ARADIA DOES, I HAVE SEEN HER SMACKING YOU IN THE HORNS.  
CG: I’D ASK ARADIA SINCE SHE IS CONSIDERABLY MORE WELL-BALANCED, BUT SHE’S CURRENTLY INDISPOSED, OR SO I HEAR.  
TA: iit ha2 been the longe2t fuckiing niight kk  
TA: iill keep an eye on crabdad but moviing2 kiind of much  
CG: I’LL MAKE SURE THE DOORS ARE KEYED TO YOU ANYWAY  
TA: they already are  
CG: OH MY FUCK, YOU IMMENSE ASSHOLE. DID YOU EVER PLAN ON TELLING ME THAT YOU HACKED MY FUCKING HIVE?  
TA: kk you added me to your 2ecuriity protocol2 liike two 2weep2 ago  
CG: OH.  
CG: I KNEW THAT.  
CG: I’D BETTER GO, KANAYA AND TEREZI ARE MAKING PLANS WITHOUT ME AND IT’S THE MOST ALARMING THING I HAVE NEVER BEEN A PART OF.  
TA: ii gue22 thii2 ii2 bye for now  
TA: troll me every niight or iill feel unloved  
CG: STOP FONDLING YOUR THROB STALK TO OUR CONVERSATIONS AND I JUST MIGHT.  
CG: TELL ARADIA TO MESSAGE ME WHEN SHE’S UP SO I KNOW YOU HAVEN’T KILLED HER WITH GROSS INCOMPETENCE.  
\-- carcinoGeneticist [CG] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --

Karkat’s handle goes dead and you sigh. He’s probably going to be too busy to bother trolling you every night, which will be strange. He’s trolled you every night you can remember because he is a verbose jerk and you were both lonely kids. When the voices got bad you’d switch over to audio feeds and watch the same movie, and Karkat’s commentary would nearly drown out the waves of screams and pain.

You don’t think you’ve ever had the opportunity to miss someone before. It sits under your sternum and feels like unease.

You shake it off, roll your shoulders until the feel of sleeping in a chair cracks out of them, and then look outside your makeshift operating theatre. Equius is working on some cyborg part for AA at what you think of as his main workbench. It’s where all the heavy-duty robotics equipment is, along with his chair. As you watch, he screws together a joint and then tests its range of movement; you think it probably has to be an arm, reduced to its base components.

“Is that going to be alright if she grows more?” you ask, your lisp worse because you’re still tired. You can’t remember not being tired.

Equius startles at the sounds of your voice. Luckily, he’s not so surprised that he bends the metal, which you’re pretty sure you’ve seen him do by hand before. If he can destroy a robot by hand, he can probably create one, too. “I performed my own research,” he says, ignoring your amusement. “It suggested that any growth from this point is mostly to replenish the body’s resources, not anything that would interfere in crafting prosthetics.” At your look of doubt, he adds, “They are made to be adjustable, to a certain degree.”

You wave a hand and cross to stand beside him. “Wasn’t doubting your craftsmanship.”

He blinks, then swivels back to focus on his work. “I did not intend to insult you,” he says out of nowhere, his attention seemingly one hundred percent on the framework he’s attaching to the two struts he just joined together. “With the Helmsman rig,” he adds, which is handy because you were stumped on how he could have insulted you by doing his own research.

You pick up a piece of wire and twist it through your fingers. “It was a good idea,” you say, and you expect it to feel like a lie but it doesn’t. It would be a good idea, if you lived in a world where it could be implemented. “We should work on it,” you say, trying to aim for a tone that implies you don’t really care and failing miserably.

This time Equius does bend one of the framework pieces. He flushes blue when he sees that you noticed and carefully bends it back into the same rough shape as it was before taking a hammer and - very carefully - reshaping it more finely.

“I figured you casted them,” you say, for lack of anything else.

“I do,” he says, the patchy blue of his cheeks deepening. “I am used to- mishaps.” Without looking at you, he says, “I had thought that you were unenthusiastic about the idea.”

You stay silent for a long while. You’re not enthusiastic about the idea at all, excepting as a means to an end. You make things you can use, like your silicomb hives. The programs you write have very specific goals, automating the shit you don’t want to do or accomplishing one purpose, like pissing off KK. As far as this goes as a project, it’s more Equius’ thing. He makes robots _because he can_ , for fuck’s sake. And not to put too fine a point on it, but your credit account can’t sustain the kinds of projects he undetakes, no matter how much work you do on the side.

You are coming to know - to actually _know_ deep in your bones, not just _think_ \- that this isn’t the world that you want to live in, though. You want Feferi to succeed. And you don’t want to be pinned in place for the rest of your life, burning away your brain to shunt a ship across a universe you’d never see except through cameras and second-hand reports. Other psionics don’t often occur to you outside of AA - you’ve found the tests used to grade psionics and you could smack most others down flat, they’re not a survival concern for you - but now you realise that this could be a benefit Feferi could use to tempt them over to your side, and a psionic army with the freedom to move at-will could be a real asset. And if afterwards they don’t get batteried, then nobody’s going to blame you for feeling glad about that.

So you’re not _enthusiastic_. You think you might be verging on hopeful, which is alarming since you’ve never known an emotion to not come back and bite you in the ass, but you can’t lie and say that you’re going to throw yourself into the project whole-heartedly. The only other chair for down here is next to AA’s operating table and Equius’ bench is covered in robot-building paraphernalia, so you turn around and lean back on it instead of sitting as you think about what to say. Equius doesn’t push you like Karkat would have, or skip six feet ahead in conversation like Aradia does. He just goes back to work and lets you think.

“Do you speak to FF often?” you finally ask.

His hands still, and then you remember that Equius has trouble talking to _Gamzee_ , who not only is just one step up the haemospectrum from Equius, but who was the most scarily egalitarian person on the fucking planet before he went off sopor. “I do not,” he finally says.

You feel like the stupidest person ever to exist, but you can’t exactly back out of the conversation now. “She wants to be Empress,” you say, the words falling leaden between you. It feels like all the air in the room just went dead and stagnant at his perfect lack of a reaction, and you don’t know how to brace yourself, because all you know about Equius’ anger management strategies is that he _punches robots to death_. You hope it doesn’t extend to treasonous psionics.

“I-” Equius says, hoarse, before clearing his throat and trying again. “The current Empress is unlikely to abdicate.”

“Yeah,” you say, through suddenly-numb lips. You are going to die.

Equius goes silent for a long time again, and you think the both of you might be sweating bullets. Finally, he says, “She is the Heiress,” still sounding completely unconvinced. “It is- not something that others have an influence on.”

You fold your arms and go for broke. You can probably keep him back with psionics, anyway, or at least float out of reach. “I’d rather it was FF. The only way this rig has any chance of seeing the inside of a spaceship is going to be her mandating it, because Her Imperial Condescension sure as shit isn’t going to.”

Equius pales, sweat adding a faint sheen to his forehead. “It would be chaos,” he says, and shakes his head slightly. “Feferi is-”

“Tyrian,” you say, throwing down the gauntlet. “If you believe in blood, you should believe in hers.”

“ _Untested_ ,” he says, before standing up abruptly, his chair clattering to the ground. “This is- treason against the Empire, it cannot be run by Feferi, it would _collapse_.” His hands form into fists, white-knuckled. “I cannot- I have to-”

And then, because you can’t control your mouth even if you’re depending on this guy to keep Aradia un-cullworthy, you say, “With the way she treats the psionic corps, do you really think that the current Empress is doing a fantastic job?”

“I have to leave,” Equius says, and spins on his heel to march off. You suspect the march is the fastest dignified retreat possible, which is why he’s not just fleeing.

You hope he’s going to find Nepeta. You hope Nepeta doesn’t decide to dine on yellowblood traitor this evening.

Your heart is thudding harder than you want to admit to and there’s a roaring in your ears now that the moment has passed. In a daze, you pick up Equius’ chair and collapse into it yourself, and only then do you start shaking, full-body tremors that have your teeth rattling and your pulse thrumming in your ears. You don’t know what you were _thinking_ , Equius has the legal right to just _murder you_ and you just went cavalierly dancing on his buttons, even if his view of blood privilege is hilariously illogical. And by hilarious, you mean terrifying.

If he tries to murder you, you are going to have to stop him, and then you’re going to have to somehow get AA up and walking on your own, and then you are going to have to live on the lam at least until Ascension. And that’s if you can get Eridan or Feferi to vouch for you, because if they don’t you are essentially cull-on-sight.

You go back to AA’s side and take her hand, squeeze it in yours, and wait.

\--

The door opens half an hour later and Equius stumbles in. The reason for his ungraceful footing is obvious when Nepeta follows him in and gives him a gentle push in your direction, saying, “Equihiss has something he would like to say.”

“ _Nepeta_ ,” Equius says, mortified.

She just raises her eyebrows at him. “So you can say it to me but not to Pawlux? That seems unfur!”

You share a look of grievous discomfort with Equius, burning to the tips of your ears at being caught in the middle of feelings jam fallout. He may have just murdered you otherwise, but at this very moment you think it might be preferable to wanting to sink through the floor and expire.

“I was hasty,” Equius grinds out. “The matter of the rule of the Empire will be settled between the Heiress and Her Imperial Condescension.” A long silence spills out before Nepeta elbows him, and he then says, “You will- I would be _gratified_ if you were still to provide your assistance with the Helmsman rig.”

“Does that mean you-” _not support_ “-would be okay with FF being Empress?” you ask, and hold your breath.

Equius shifts uncomfortably before saying, “I believe that a detachable rig would be enough of an advantage that the Empire would implement it. We shall have to disagree.”

You want to snarl that your life isn’t a matter of _agreeing to disagree_ , but Aradia’s hand is still in yours, and you’re going to need Equius until she’s conscious and walking. So you just nod instead, and say, “Maybe you should talk to FF about her plans for the Empire,” because Feferi Peixes will have no compunctions about telling Equius how wrong he is and in exactly what ways, and Equius will have to listen to her out of his sense of duty.

You make a mental note to tell Feferi to go easy on Equius. Shutting him down completely isn’t going to help anyone.

Equius blanches, but Nepeta says, “That’s a great idea!” and you know he’ll do it.

\--

Aradia’s growth has completely stopped, from the scans that you’ve taken of her hourly over the past two evenings. Now she’s putting back on the fat she lost over the ordeal, sucking up the ambiguously nutritious slop plugged into her faster than you want to replace it. Her skin has evened out completely and lightened, and the new bioflesh seems to have taken, though it’s still angry fuchsia where it joins with the old bioflesh and delicate to the touch. Her horns are longer and thicker than they used to be, the planes of her face subtly different.

Even though you know Karkat’s already been through it and come out the other side, part of your brain panics in circles, wondering if she’ll still be the same person when she wakes up. Karkat, as you predicted, hasn’t been online since he left; you’re guessing that the back of a dragon doesn’t have great reception, and he’s probably collapsing into a cupe whenever they stop for day. He still has his own little brain-panic-cycle going on, anyway. If someone had told you five sweeps ago that you’d be panicking over trolls that you care about like this, you would have politely told them to shove it up their waste chute, but here you are.

You’re kind of sick of slicing AA open, but this should hopefully be the last time for a while. You do it alongside the scar where bioflesh meets troll flesh, down from the shoulder and across the hip. There’s no structure below the bioflesh - yet - so it’s easy to pull it back and away, before you gather up the main arteries - you think one is technically a vein, but you’re better at remembering ‘input’ and ‘output’ than the proper names - of AA’s fake circulatory system and look at Equius. “Ready?”

He gestures to the heart-lung machine, a crude pump more than anything. He’s already primed it with some of the blood mix he uses for his more organic robots, which should be fine to use with AA.  “The anticoagulant should be in effect,” he says. The lead tubing and cannulae are already attached to the pump, with Equius holding them in order to hand to you as quickly as possible. Your question was nerves and nothing more, but you think being nervous at this point is fair.

You take a deep breath, then take the first cannula and carefully insert it into the input artery. The pump in the heart-lung machine sucks a little down, but most of it continues through AA’s mechanical heart, and will until you’re done. The other cannula gets stuck in the output artery, creating a closed loop. Now you just have to remove the extraneous pump. No big deal, just your moirail’s heart.

You take two clamps from the tray and clamp down on the arteries as close to AA’s heart as you can. The complete lack of reaction to you cutting off her supply of blood is more alarming than you want to think about - this is all it takes to kill someone, her life is in your hands _again_ \- so you grab the scalpel from the tray next to you and cut the arteries free, clamps and all. Now her circulatory system is directed through the heart-lung machine, which will both pump and oxygenate her blood, and her old heart is just kind of chilling in her chest.

You feel woozy, and are more certain than ever that a career in surgery is not for you.

It’s Equius’ job from here, now that you’ve done the fiddly work that he didn’t want to do. It’s still complicated, since he has to take out all the old organs and replace them with the newer, better versions he’s crafted, but at least he’s not going to tear open her still-beating heart by accident, now. His hands are sure as he takes out the old organs, pumps and filters still with a thin coat of AA’s blood that you suction back into circulation.

You used to think that robots were less messy than trolls. Every time you’ve had to work on Aradia, you expect her to be pristine inside, a hollow concavity of stainless steel with all her organs and tubing neatly arranged, like a computer. Instead, you get blood on your hands and clanking, messed-up mechanical lungs, or a tangle of old plastic veins that need to be replaced. And as the new stuff goes in all you can think about, besides the automatic processes of handing over what’s needed, is that the organic in Aradia will rot the inorganic away, that she will always be in a constant state of slowly dying.

It’s what everyone does, but the unfairness of it hits you harder when it’s AA.

Equius situates the major organs first, heart and lung, before working on the trickier things, like reconstructing half a diaphragm and re-patching her stomach, replacing the tubing linking the missing parts of her intestines, carefully ensuring that her reproductive system is still functional. It wouldn’t make much sense to pour all this work into Aradia if she was just going to get culled for reproductive infirmity, and thankfully what’s left of her organic side can provide the material.

It takes long hours for Equius to finish these procedures, checking and double-checking all the connections and possible failure points before he is satisfied. You’re pretty sure that it’s well into daylight hours by the time he’s done, but you are so miserably sick of staring at AA’s innards that you don’t want to stitch her back up just to have to operate on her again.

“Are you tired?” you ask Equius, bluntly. “Fuck, of course you’re tired. I’m tired. But can we finish this now?”

Equius looks up at you uncertainly before dropping his eyes back to Aradia, and you hope that even if his feelings for her are gone that he sees what you see and wants to finish it up as quickly as you do. “I would be concerned about the quality-”

“I’ll do all the nerve stuff,” you say, “just spot me and then put in the ribcage, I know you finished that before you slept, and then we can bring her out of this.”

Equius shakes his head before sighing deeply. “If you are alert enough to perform the grafting...”

“Worked on less,” you say, and find the sensors.

\--

The room sounds empty without the sound of the heart-lung machine, the only sound now the slight beeps of the monitors hooked up to AA like she’s a normal troll. Equius is sewing her back up and all you can do is watch as her torso takes shape again around the prosthetic ribs attached to the stubs of her old, burned-away ones. You feel a lot better about everything now that she has structure to her body again.

You hand over the larger chestplates that Equius made based on scans of her new, adult body and your best guesses as to how much weight she’d gain back and where. Those can be easily adjusted, at least, since they just screw down through the bioflesh, shielding the more delicate parts the two of you have slaved away on over the past few bilunars. The smaller plates around her waist that allow flexibility get hooked in as well, and all of a sudden she’s more whole than she’s been since she started moulting. Only her arm and her leg have to be completed, and you’re pretty sure that Equius is almost done, on both counts.

Equius turns off the anaesthetic, and that’s another sound gone.

“Thanks,” you say, to fill the silence, and collapse into your chair. All the tired that you were staving off with concentration and sheer willpower crashes down on you, and you take off your glasses to press your hands to your face. You almost wish that you had a headache so that you didn’t feel so empty. “I’ll take it from here,” you say, muffled by your palms. “Go get some sleep.”

He hesitates, before saying, “If you require a recuperacoon...”

You look at him over your hand and start snickering. You can hear the hysteria in it yourself, bubbling to the surface. “EQ, do you think I’m gonna be sleeping?”

“No,” he says, surprising you with his honesty. “But you should. It is unlikely that Aradia will wake until dusk.”

“I know,” you say. He nods, lowblood caretaking responsibilities taken care of, and leaves, turning off the lights as he goes. You’re left in shadows and the faint gloom of LED displays, blue and red tinting the surfaces around you, and as you have done so many times before, you sit and wait for your moirail to get better.

\--

You’ve drifted off a little - not sleeping, but not daydreaming either - when you feel the ghost of another presence in the room. Instead of opening your eyes, you screw them more tightly shut and - yes, that’s definitely AA’s psi that your horns are picking up. Just wisps of it, since she’s probably not awake yet, but she’s _there_.

You stand up and get a glass of tepid water. By the time you’ve come back, including a short break to make sure you’re composed, Aradia’s eyes have opened. She focusses on you, barely, and creaks out, “S’lux?”

“That’s me,” you confirm, and tilt the back of the table up so she’s sitting, at least a little. Enough to not immediately choke on the water you hold up to her lips. “Here, you’ll feel better.”

She sips down the water, a little at a time. You’ve still got her on the IV, so she shouldn’t be dehydrated, but it’ll at least clear out the feel of sleep-gunk in her mouth and she’s stop sounding like she ate razors. Plus it’s a good test of whether or not she’ll keep anything down.

When she’s done, she cranes her head weakly to look down at herself. “I got taller,” she says, with a faint note of disbelief. It’s probably disconcerting, going to sleep as a child and waking up an adult. “I’m taller than you,” she says, with a small, tired smile, and looks up at you.

Her eyes are completely red. All of your thought processes - keep the IV for a while longer, fit the prosthetics tomorrow, recovery should just be a few days and then we’re out of here - grind to a halt in favour of _she’s alive_.

Awkward, ungraceful, you curl over her body, press her chest to yours and wrap your arms around her. She’s Aradia-warm and Aradia-solid just like she always has been, and when her arm squeezes around your shoulders you feel a sob building up in your throat. You hiccough through your teeth with the effort of keeping it suppressed, a painful gasp that you can’t control, and then Aradia presses her forehead to your head and you can’t stop. You pour out all of your fear at once, crying as quietly as you can into her shoulder as she strokes your back. She doesn’t try to shoosh you, and you feel better once you’re done, not empty like you have through the entire ordeal.

You settle back into your chair and she reaches over to wipe away your tears with her thumb. “Miss me?” she asks.

“Fuck you,” you say back, and squeeze her hand. She smiles and falls back asleep, and you dare to think that everything’s going to be okay.


	11. Chapter 11

Aradia is still too weak to stay awake for long, but by the time dusk rolls around she looks a lot better, even to your eyes. You manage to take a nap at around then and wake up a few hours later to her poking you in the shoulder weakly.

“AA?” You sit up and rub your eyes to clear away the fuzziness. “Sup?”

“Bored now,” she says, and you groan. You need more sleep. You may, in fact, need all the sleep. Undaunted, she makes a ‘gimme’ gesture with her hand. “Palmtop.”

Instead of bothering to get up and find hers, wherever it is, you dig yours out of your pocket and hand it over before slumping back over, your head resting on the edge of the table. It’s too late now, though; you are completely awake and can already tell that you’re doomed to not get any more sleep for a while.

“What happened while I was out?” she asks, fumbling a bit as she tries to use your palmtop one-handed without dropping it. You hope her psionics are okay and that she’s just too muzzy from recovering from major surgery to use them. “Ooh, Karkat! Can I read the logs?”

You groan again in assent before you sit up. “He left a couple nights ago. You should text him, he’s worried.”

“That’s sweet.”  Aradia scrolls through the endless walls of Karkat grey and does her best to not laugh hard enough to aggravate the still-healing bioflesh. You can tell when she gets up to the part where he’s moirailed to Feferi because she makes a noise that sounds like ‘ _gkkk_.’

“Yeah,” you say, and try to stretch a crick out of your shoulders. It doesn’t work. “That happened.”

“Wow,” AA says, and drops the palmtop into her lap. “This is what happens when you fall asleep for a week.” She sighs, deeply. “I’m sorry, Sollux. It can’t have been easy.”

You pause mid-stretch and look at her, completely aghast. “AA, it’s my fault you _needed_ to.”

“It’s Vriska’s fault,” she says, her tone steel. “Not yours, not ever.”

You take her hand and grip it tight, fighting back the sick feeling in you that you get whenever you think about how very much your fault it is. “I would do anything for you, AA,” you say, as intensely as you can because some things deserve intensity. “I’d fucking tear a drone to pieces for you. This shit is nothing.”

“And yet you’ll never come on a dig with me,” she quips, but squeezes your hand. Her eyes, still newly-red and startling for it, catch and hold you, assessing. “What’s wrong?”

You freeze, because sure, you intend to tell AA about Vriska, but she just woke up. If she gets angry she could tear open her stitches and maybe even damage the neural network, since it’s still so new and may not have fully integrated itself with her yet. And there’s still the petty, selfish part of you that doesn’t want to tell her about your deals with Vriska and the fact that Vriska’s already come in pursuit of you once, because having to admit that you screwed up is something that you never enjoy.

“Later,” you say, and draw away. “You should rest up.”

Disappointment is so much harder to bear from AA’s eyes now. You stroke her cheek and she closes them, abating your guilt. “’M gonna smack you when I wake up,” she says, soft and slurred.

You tuck a lock of hair behind her ear and say, “Yeah.”

\--

You can’t sleep again after that, your insides churning and guilt seeping into your bones, so you text Karkat that AA’s woken up and hasn’t imploded but she’s sleeping so the gossip has to wait, then you find one of Equius’ lab computers and turn it on. It’s not your rig, but it’ll do for fucking around on the internet until someone needs you to be useful. You keep having to slap yourself away from anywhere particularly seditious, off-planet, or both, since Equius doesn’t have the same security you’ve built up for yourself, so in the end you give it up as more frustrating than time-killing, but not until after noticing the increased freaking out over moulting on the forums you frequent. Also the increased amount of porn from it, which makes you doubly glad you put AA under and makes you wonder in a completely non-sexual way how the fuck KK went through moulting without concupiscent partners. The idiot probably nailed his hands to his desk or something.

Equius comes down a few hours later, when you’ve given up on the internet and have started putting together neat little Trojans because you can. AA’s still asleep, because apparently people recovering from surgery need a lot of sleep, but the feel of the room is different to what it was, AA’s return to voluntary unconsciousness colouring the air of the lab with imperceptible sounds and a low-grade buzz of unused psi.

He nods awkwardly to you before taking his seat at what you think of as his robot-building bench, pulls a magnifier into place, and is immediately lost to the world. You were going to bug him for food, but if it means getting out of here sooner, you can’t complain. You just haven’t felt so useless in a while. It’d be different, if you were at your hivestem with your own computer, but using someone else’s feels wrong and throws you off your game.

Luckily, Aradia wakes up not long after, without falling straight back to sleep. She takes the water you bring her and then says, “What happened?” quietly, nodding towards Equius.

You pull a face. “Stop knowing things.”

“Never,” she says, and raises an eyebrow at you. It makes you feel two sweeps old. “Is it a problem?”

“We had a disagreement and it’s still awkward,” you say, hunching your shoulders in defensively. “I sorted it. It’s not like we were going to be BFFs anyway.”

“Uh-huh,” AA says, and hands you the now-empty glass. “I want food that’s not from a tube.”

You sketch an exaggerated bow learned from Eridan sweeps ago. “Anything else?”

“Equius!” Aradia calls. Across the lab, Equius starts – you’re beginning to think that he’s not used to other people in his lab – before standing. “Could you keep me company while Sollux gets me some food?” she asks, and you are going to _bite_ her.

Equius doesn’t complain, just unlocks the door on the way over. He’s gone an odd shade of blue that makes you wonder if he’s over AA after all, and it just gets worse when you mutter, “Sorry,” to him and disappear out the door. You know that AA’s romantically bound to meddle in your life, but for once, you’re glad you’re not the one who has to deal with the snoopbomb going off.

The nutrition block is more sleek than yours, which usually has whatever receptacles you used for heating up food in the last week all over the counters, as well as your honey-filtering equipment depending on how lazy you’ve been about cleanup. It takes several attempts to find the storage unit that holds the dishes, and then you have to find something that AA will actually be able to keep down, which ends up being an ancient can of vegetable soup. Nepeta makes no appearance as you bash around in the nutrition block, although Aurthour comes in halfway through and makes distressed noises until you manage to explain that it’s for your moirail. Yes, like Nepeta. No, she can’t have a steak, she’s sick. No, your moirail, not Nepeta. No, it’s fine, you’ve got this.

You’re going to have to go and check on Bicyclops soon. Your lusus doesn’t need feeding often, but. You’re just going to have to check on him. End of story.

Eventually you have absolutely no excuse for staying out of the lab, so you take the bowl of soup and head back down. AA has her palmtop and is gamely plinking away at it with the aura of someone who has recently won a verbal sparring match, and Equius has retreated back to his robot station to lick his wounds.

“Seems like a lot happened while I was out,” AA says, taking the bowl from you with a surge of power that feels strange against your skin. It makes you feel better to know that she’s still fully herself, anyway. You hand her the spoon and sit down, only to yelp when she taps one of your horns with the spoon. “That was a hint to spill the beans.”

You rub the sore spot on your horn. “What beans?”

“Starts with V, ends with A,” she prompts, before actually eating a spoonful of the soup you got her. Her eyes stay sharp and focussed on yours, and you’re not going to be able to get her to go to sleep and ask about it later this time. Later has come.

You decide to downplay it. “She got KK’s ident details for me, so I owe her a favour.” Her look doesn’t change, so you shrug. “It’s just scouting out some scrap metal, no big deal. I thought it was worse than it is, but we had a chat.”

Aradia eats her soup and stays silent.

“I know it was a dumb decision,” you admit, because it really was. “But there wasn’t anyone else, and I made sure TZ knew to get revenge if I didn’t check in.” As soon as the words leave your mouth, you regret it and want to swallow them back down.

“Revenge,” Aradia says, flatly. “Sollux-”

“I know!” you say, desperate. “I know, I meant, like- insurance, so TZ would know to keep you away from VK for sure if things went south, not- not this again. So she could end it if she had to. That’s it.” Your hands shake because – well, you know what you meant, but it just occurred to you that if you’d been late checking in with TZ, you could have started all the Scourge Sisters shit up again. Terezi is... neither of you have really acknowledged it, but ever since those days you may as well have been wearing ashen quadrant rings for each other, if that was a thing you did. She needed – still needs – someone to keep her away from Vriska because it will only end in heartbreak, and you nearly opened that door back up.

If you didn’t need them to survive, you’d dump all your quadrantmates. It would be kinder.

Aradia rests her spoon in the bowl of soup and reaches over to touch your forehead. “I’ll sort it out,” she promises. “Vriska’s not likely to take me on, now. It would mean losing too much. And I’m not as likely to put up with her shit as you are.”

“No!” Before you quite know what you’re doing, you have one hand on AA’s cheek in the most public display of moirallegiance you’ve ever indulged in. Equius is behind you, out of your field of vision, but you imagine he’s sweating profusely. You don’t care. You stroke AA’s cheek with one hand and run the other through her hair, scraping your claws lightly along her scalp. “No, no, bad idea,” you say in a strange, half-crooning tone. “AA, she will _eat you alive_. You know she doesn’t think things between you are settled.”

Aradia pushes into your hand before pulling away, regretfully. “Don’t _moirail_ me out of this, Sollux-”

“That’s my _job_ ,” you plead. “AA-”

“-She’s not going to attack me when it means bringing everyone she knows down on her,” Aradia says, and slaps your hands away. “You, on the other hand, have proven yourself to be easily manipulated. She’s going to keep going through you to get at me unless we shut her down, now.”

“Then we get someone immune to her _fucking mind powers_.” You dig your nails into her hand. “AA, this is not a bad idea, it is the _worst_ idea, just wait until TZ gets back and she can deal with VK.”

“I’m your moirail too,” Aradia snaps. “I’m not letting Vriska think she can exploit you to get back at me. It’s bad for both of us.”

You chance a look over your shoulder at Equius, who has his back to you and is pretending very loudly to not hear a single word either of you are saying, before turning back to Aradia and hissing, “I don’t give a fuck what VK wants as long as it’s not you, dead.” Equius already knows that Aradia is your weak point, for whatever good it does him. He’s never once used it against you, not like Vriska would. You wouldn’t care if he did, as long as he didn’t stop helping her.

“And I feel the same,” Aradia says, before pointedly squeezing your hand. You ease up on the pressure, long white-red marks flooding with colour again. “Which is why I’m sorting it out now, before she comes after either of us.” She pauses, looks down at herself and her distinct lack of limbs, and adds, “Well, soon.”

“You mean you’re not a match for Vriska Serket minus an arm and a leg?” you ask, sourly.

Aradia smiles in victory. “I think she needs _both_ middle fingers and a boot up the ass before she understands anything.”

Across the room, Equius chokes on air. You think very sadly about what your life has become.

\--

“Stand,” Equius orders.

Aradia plants both hands onto the table and swings herself off, landing solidly on both feet. She staggers a moment before righting herself, one hand clinging to the edge of the table, the other shooing Equius away. “I’m fine,” she says, before spreading her stance to shoulder-width apart, planting her feet solidly. After a moment of rocking back and forth, she says, “It’s a little long.”

“Feet together and fully extend both legs,” he says, fetching a screwdriver. Aradia rolls her eyes at you but does as ordered, snapping briskly into position with military enthusiasm. Equius kneels next to her leg and slides the casing off both the thigh and calf before beckoning Aradia to lean down. “The height adjustment controls are here and here,” he says, tapping two points with his screwdriver. “There should be enough allowance built in for any continual growth you may go through.” From the angle you’re at, you can see his eyes dart away nervously behind his sunglasses. “Does the prosthetic chafe your other leg?”

“It’s fine,” she says, her hair brushing Equius’ shoulder as she watches him work. “Just the height feels off.”

Equius carefully adjusts Aradia’s leg, shaving tiny amounts of height from the thigh and calf equally, with pauses to see if it suits Aradia any better. When it’s done he shows her how to replace the casing and oil the necessary joints, then goes through the same procedure with her arm.

“If any repairs are necessary, inform me,” he says, brusquely, once they’re finished with the live instruction manual. He then nods to you and leaves.

Aradia shakes her head before stretching. “Sollux, where are my clothes?”

You fetch her clothes, which have been mysteriously laundered at some point, probably by Aurthour.  That doesn’t change the problem of them not fitting, which somehow both of you failed to realise would happen. Her skirt still fits around her hips, barely, since she still hasn’t regained all the weight she lost, but it’s a lot more knee-length than it used to be. Her shirt is a lost cause entirely. Her underwear isn’t worth anything more than a gloomy look.

“I’ll ask EQ for one of his tanks,” you say.

Aradia pulls a face. “I don’t want his symbol on me.”

“Wear it inside out,” you say, and resign yourself to being in the debt of every single fucking blueblood you know.

\--

Despite your protests, and despite the fact that she’s in an uncomfortably tight skirt and an inside-out tank top, AA insists that not paying Vriska a visit now would be a waste of energy. Your sane suggestion that she should probably _recover from major surgery_ before taking on Vriska falls on deaf ears.

“It’s just going to be a brief chat!” Aradia pats you on the shoulder. “Sollux, I _know_ I’m not up to brawling with Vriska. I’m just going to tell her to lay off before I have to make life unpleasant for her again.”

“And I can’t come with you because?” you ask, unmoved.

Aradia leans on your shoulder. Her hair spills over the exposed skin at your collar and you shudder at the feeling. “I know I get volatile,” she says, in a tone that sounds sad and guilty and _old_. “I know I haven’t always done my best by you. And I know that’s how I got into this situation in the first place. I _promise_ , Sollux, this is just going to be a talk. The moment she tries anything, I’m out, and I will ruin her.”

“I don’t care how ruined she is if you’re dead,” you say, for the umpteenth time. “We could just _go_ , AA. We could join up with KK and do shit with him, or move across the planet and wait for Ascension.”

“With her following us the entire way because we betrayed her?” Aradia shakes her head. “We need to deal with this, not run from it. And I keep telling you, she’s not going to kill me. She’d be risking too much. Besides-” She tilts your head up until she can brush her lips across yours, all pale-I-know-you, “-you wouldn’t leave now that things are getting interesting.”

“I hate that you know me, sometimes,” you say, and rest your forehead on hers. “Check in with me.”

“Of course,” she says. You watch her until she lands on the other side of the canyon, and only then do you take off for your own hivestem, the comfort of a place where you fit, your own standards and your own life instead of the horror story you’ve been living recently. Aradia just has to make it back from Vriska unharmed and everything will be fine.

\--

\-- apocalypseArisen [AA] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   
AA: sollux can i stay with you today   
TA: 2ure   
TA: are you out of vk’2   
TA: are you ok   
AA: um   
AA: about that   
AA: yeah ill just talk to you when i get there   
TA: aa thii2 ii2 NOT HELPIING   
\-- apocalypseArisen [AA] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   
TA: AA!!

\--

It’s barely before dawn when Aradia knocks on your window. You shove it open with psionics, nearly tearing it out of its frame, and she floats in before collapsing onto the floor. It’s a long flight from where Vriska and Equius are to your place, and like you keep saying, she’s recovering from surgery. You rush to help her up, but she waves you off and stands up on wobbly legs. “I’m fine, Sollux! I’m fine.”

“Then what-” She tilts her head up and you suck in a breath, cutting yourself off. She’s covered in bruises and her flesh is scratched up, and for a moment you see red. Debt or not, Vriska does not get away with fucking with your moirail- but then AA smiles, sheepish, and the anger drops away, along with your stomach. “Oh, AA, no,” you moan. “Please, no.”

“It’s weird being an adult!” she protests. “It just kind of happened.”

You bury your face in your hands. “No,” you say, muffled. “Tell me this isn’t happening. This isn’t my life. I’m changing my identity and moving to some backwater town on the other side of the planet, and then I’m going to pay some brainfucker to make me believe I’ve always been Pollux Castor.”

Aradia rests her chin on your shoulder. “One day you’ll understand,” she says, gravely. “When you do, tell me, because I don’t understand at all. Vriska was never hot,” she adds, mournfully. “When did she get hot?”

You sigh and add ‘get AA an auspice’ to your mental list of tasks. One day the list might actually get shorter.


	12. Chapter 12

Aradia doesn’t use cupes since sopor would be obnoxious to clean off of her cyborg parts no matter how waterproof they are, which means she’s always awake before you are and disgustingly bright about it. This evening she’s decided to wake you and the rest of your hivestem up by blaring music when the sun’s barely down, and you’ve slithered over to your computer to turn it off before you even know that you’re awake.

“AA,” you groan in one long, drawn-out whine. “It’s-”

“There’s food,” she says, and picks you up with her psionics. “Ugh, but only if you stop dripping on the floor, you are gross sometimes.”

“Neighbours,” you manage to say, kicking your brain up a gear.

“I’ll deal,” she says, and dumps you into the bathroom. You decide to let her, since she obviously feels bad about the whole Vriska thing if she’s feeding you and dealing with your stemmates, all of whom are midbloods and very serious about quiet hours. “I’ll feed your lusus,” she calls, and you slump your way into the ablutions stall entirely.

\--

The world feels somewhat more welcoming when you’re done rinsing the sopor off - or, if you’re honest, leaning against the stall wall and letting the ablutions spray do all the work. Aradia has breakfast ready, a decent meal instead of whatever you usually shove in your face for once. She’s taken the computer chair, which means you get to sit on one of the bumps of your cupe and balance the plate on your lap. Instead of eating, Aradia looks pensively at you. You return the favour and wish you had your glasses, which are somewhere on the desk behind her.

“So, about Vriska,” she starts, and you wave your nutrition fork. “Sollux-”

“Food first.” You stab what you assume is some of an egg - did you have eggs? Apparently so - and shove it in your mouth before adding, “Seeing if I flip ashen for you second.”

“Fine.” Aradia leans forward, one elbow braced on her knee, and says, “What now? Apart from Vriska.”

You chew mechanically. You’re already over this entire revolution. Nobody ever told you it would require effort to be a cog in the machine. It was one of the few things you were looking forward to about being a Helmsman. “Promised EQ I’d work with him on a thing,” you say, eventually. “Should probably check in with ED. And I guess you need to spend some time with FF? And we should bug KN or TZ for an update since KK’s not responding.”

Aradia hums before finally starting to eat her own food. “You’re spending a lot of time with Equius lately.”

You want to point out that spending time with a robotics expert happens a lot when your moirail is a cyborg, but it seems unkind after having to tear her apart and put her back together over the past week. “How are you feeling?” you ask, instead. “You didn’t pop anything last night, did you?”

She shakes her head. “Not that I can tell. Equius?”

You sigh. “He has a fucking awesome lab and he could be useful to FF. Alright?”

Aradia sighs too, a heavy from-the-pit-of-the-stomach mockery of your short huff. “It’s okay to be friends with someone, you know?” she says. “Even a _highblood_. You’re not betraying anyone.”

You set your plate aside, your hunger gone, and link your hands together as you collect your thoughts. “That’s a dumb argument,” you say, finally, to her eyebrows shooting up. “I’m friends with TZ and I get on okay with FF, and I am kind of bumping bulges with ED.” She pulls a face and you pull one in return. “Plus I thought KK was hemonymous because he was some kind of highblood scourge when we were grubs. So it’s not that EQ is highblooded, it’s that he’s a complete tool.”

Aradia snorts, then covers her face with her hand to hide her grin. “Sollux!”

“He is _such_ a tool,” you counter.

“ _You’re_ a tool,” she says, and you can’t refute that. “Why are you doing this rig thing with him if he’s such a tool? The Empress and all her horrorterrors couldn’t make you do something you don’t want to, so you must want to, at least a little.”

You stare at your hands, because even to your moirail, admitting that you- have gotten _used_ to, that you even _like_ working with Equius makes you feel like some kind of blood traitor. TZ doesn’t give a shit about blood unless it’s delicious, FF is adorably clueless but working hard, ED is a hatefriend so having things to hate him for helps, but Equius just... exists. And you kind of feel _sorry_ for him about it, about the fact that he had to pretend that AA was some kind of honorary blueblood to be interested in her, about how he didn’t know how much the Empire screws you all over.

“I didn’t think,” you say, and swallow. AA makes an encouraging noise and you continue. “I didn’t think that they actually gave a shit, you know? But EQ didn’t _know_ how we’re treated, and as soon as I told him, he came up with this rig as if it solves everything, which is just, it doesn’t, but I don’t want to slap it down and be fuel for the whole ungrateful lowbloods thing. And if FF wins it could actually be something she could implement.”

Aradia chirrs at you in pity and your cheeks burn, even before she wheels your chair closer so that your knees bump. “I don’t see how that’s a bad thing,” she says, infinitely gentle.

You stare at her knees where her skirt has ridden up, one smooth grey and the other cold, hard silver. “Because it _doesn’t_ change anything,” you say. “Lowbloods are still going to get fucked over.”

She flicks your forehead, and not gently either. Her nails are long and sharp and probably left a mark; she has no pity when she thinks you’re drowning in enough of your own, and most of the time she’s right. “The problem with you,” she says, “is that you think a little change is no change, instead of the beginning of a big change.” When you sigh, she says, “I’m not saying Equius is suddenly going to understand! But he seems to already be more open to _listening_.”

“Big deal.” You jazz-hands imaginary confetti to mark the imaginary occasion of a highblood _listening_ to you.

“Yes, it’s a _big deal_ ,” Aradia says, and jazz-hands back at you. “Think of it as a continuum! On one end is Vriska and on the other end is Feferi and Equius is somewhere in-between. I’d rather there were more on the Feferi end, personally.”

You sigh and slump in defeat. “Fine. I have _mixed feelings_ about working with EQ but think it will be beneficial in the end. Happy?”

“I am always happy,” she says, solemn. Then she does her creepy rictus grin face right up in your face and laughs when you fall off the jut of recuperacoon you were sitting on. “I’m taking ablutions,” she informs you, and then leaves you to recover from your grievous injuries on your own.

\--

“Sollux!”

“What?” you yell back, sticking your head into the hallway. AA sounded... well, not _mad_ exactly, but there was something in her voice that sets you on edge. If water got somewhere it wasn’t meant to and shorted out anything you are going to flip your desk right out the fucking window, you swear. “AA?”

She leans into the hallway, around the ablutions chamber door, a towel wrapped around her and another wrapped around her hair. Everything seems fine and you’re relieved, until she dangles a long swathe of Eridan-purple material where you can see it. He left his cape at your hive. He left his _cape_ at your _hive_. You think that means you have the full legal right to strangle him.

“Can I turn this into a dress?” AA asks

You stare at her until the grin creeping up your face feels disturbing, even to you. Then you say, in little more than a breath in case the opportunity collapses, “ _Fuck_ yes.” You turn back to your desk and scrabble through a drawer until you find some electrical tape, then toss the roll to her. “I get to take pics to taunt ED with, though.”

She salutes you with the roll of tape and disappears back into the ablutions chamber, presumably to perform acts of clothing improvisation that border on indecent. You have no idea how AA’s going to turn a cape into a dress, but you’re pretty sure that Eridan is going to be down a cape because of it, and that is a cause you can get behind.

Ten minutes and several alarming sounds of tape tearing later, AA appears again in a very short, very purple dress that’s essentially the cape taped into a tube, with some more tape shaping the midsection so that it’s less likely to fall off. She strikes a pose against the door and you snap a pic before the both of you dissolve into helpless laughter.

“So should I tell him to show up to FLARP like this or just let the picture speak for itself?” you ask, cursor hovering over the _send_ button.

Aradia flips her hair, sending water everywhere in a truly unfortunate and pitiful way. You love her even when she is wrecking your hive and one night she will be your ruin, but not tonight. “Please, Eridan couldn’t pull this off if he had a winch.”

You snicker and hit send, declining to comment.

\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has started trolling caligulasAquarium [CA] --  
TA: hey ed  
TA is sending file ‘2ocape2miightbeok.jpg’  
CA: wwhat  
CA: captor havve you been replaced wwith an alien o  
CA: oh my god  
CA: WWHAT HAS SHE DONE TO MY CAPE  
TA: ehehehehe  
TA: <3<  
CA: there are fuckin limits sol  
TA: 2he 2ays to tell you that 2he work2 iit better than you ever wiill  
CA: some a us could wwear a fuckin burlap sack an make it wwork   
CA: is that tape  
CA: did she really put fuckin tape all ovver it  
TA: yeah iim about two melt iit on for addiitiional 2tabiiliity  
CA: SOL NO  
TA: whoop2 two late  
TA: and there’2 no ziip 2o ii gue22 aa wiill have two cut iit off  
CA: that fuckin fabric is wworth more than the twwo a you get in a goddamn equinox an i swwear to the empress an all a her cronies captor that i wwill be gettin the cost back one wway or the other  
TA: wow 2woon  
TA: ii thought you diidn’t care about the cape2  
CA: i care wwhenevver my fuckin personal property is disrespected an im pretty sure this counts as disrespect  
TA: awe2ome  
TA: 2ee you later?  
CA: fuck you  
TA: ii’m takiing that a2 a ye2  
\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has ceased trolling caligulasAquarium [CA] --

Just as you’re about to minimise the Trollian window, another message pops up.

\-- arachnidsGrip [AG] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --  
AG: Don’t think you’re getting off the hook just 8ecause I’m 8anging your moirail!  
TA: ugh could you have put that in a gro22er way  
AG: I tell it like it is, Sol!   
AG: And the way it is is that you still owe me some scouting. Now that Megido 8n’t in danger of dying, you owe it sooner!  
AG: L8r, loser!!!!!!!!  
\-- arachnidsGrip [AG] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --  
TA: wow you are liiterally the wor2t.

Aradia, reading over your shoulder, rolls her eyes. “Really, can you blame me?” she asks, straightening up with a stretch. “Every time she uses eight exclamation marks I just want to take her keyboard away and tell her she can have it back when she learns to not.”

You shove your hands firmly over your ears. “This is me not listening to anything about you and Vriska,” you say, loudly. “In fact, this is me not acknowledging you and Vriska as a thing, since it is still the worst idea you have _ever had_.”

Aradia sighs and sits on your lap, crushing your thigh uncomfortably. “How far away is Ascension, Sollux?”

You lower your hands from your ears, slowly dropping them as you consider. “I guess it’s technically when FF moults?”

“And how far away do you think that is, now?” AA asks. “Half a sweep? A quarter?” When you don’t reply, she settles her hand on the back of your neck. “We both know that I’m one step away from being cullbait, and having good matches is going to be something that keeps me from falling off that step,” she says, rubbing tiny soothing circles into the base of your neck because she knows you hate it when she’s right. “And there’s nobody I could ever hate more than Vriska.”

“What if she’s just using you?” You flick your nails against the metal of her leg, producing a soft _tink_. It wouldn’t be the first time they’ve played at hate just to smack the shit out of each other, and if it happens again you don’t think either of them is going to survive.

“It’s fine.” Aradia crosses her legs, flesh over metal, taking away your ability to make your point. “In the end, I’m using her too.”

\--

It feels surreal, going back to your life after spending so long in Equius’ lab. Your computer feels strange to you, the bees are a little more standoffish, and in a spectacular moment of idiocy, you trip over your laundry pile because you forgot it existed. You spend most of the night on the roof with Bicyclops, leaning against his flank while you catch up on things with your palmtop. He falls asleep after a couple of hours, his right head messing up your hair every time he snores, and only then do you sneak back downstairs.

Aradia said she’d check in with Terezi, since you’re shouldering the burden of dealing with Eridan whenever he drags his ass over. After that she’s probably going to meet up with Feferi, although none of you are really sure _why_ ; at least she can update FF on the work you’re doing with Equius, so that’s something. Either way, it leaves you without much to do, which normally you’d relish, but this time you can’t just crawl back into your cupe and refuse to come out. You don’t even particularly want to, which is strange enough to be noteworthy.

The Trojan you crafted for KK is still doing the rounds and still hasn’t done anything particularly interesting, but while you’re checking it, a message from TZ pops up.

\-- gallowsCalibrator [GC] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --  
GC: 1 H34R YOU 4R3 P1N1NG OV3R OUR F34RL3SS L34D3R!  
GC: TH1S 1S 4N 4DOR4BL3 D3V3LOPM3NT 4ND 1 4PPROV3.  
TA: tz?   
GC: WH4T G4V3 1T 4W4Y?  
TA: tz you jerk iit’2 been a week wiith no contact where the fuck have you all been  
GC: 1 H34RD YOU W3R3 BUSY, 4PPL3B3RRY! 4LMOST 4S BUSY 4S W3 M4Y OR M4Y NOT H4V3 B33N.  
GC: 4LSO YOU H4D TO R3SORT TO G3TT1NG YOUR MO1R41L TO T3LL M3 OF YOUR D3L1C1OUS S4DN3SS, WH1CH 1S C3RT41NLY 4 STR1K3 4G41NST D1R3CT COMMUN1C4T1ONS W1TH YOU.  
GC: 4S FOR WH3R3 W3 H4V3 B33N, 1 TH1NK 1T M4Y B3 B3ST 1F W3 DONT 4CTU4LLY N4M3 N4M3S. L3TS S4Y YOU C4N G3T QU1T3 F4R ON 4 DR4GON’S B4CK 4ND L34V3 1T 4T TH4T.  
TA: yeah fiine  
TA: remiind me two 2end you encryptiion 2hiit next tiime you’re not on your palmtop  
GC: SH4LL DO.  
TA: 2o where2 kk? a2iide from a my2teriiously far off locatiion  
GC: 4SL33P.  
GC: W3 W3R3 T4LK1NG 4BOUT 1T1N3R4R13S B3FOR3 1 GOT 4R4D14’S M3SS4G3 AND TH3N WH1L3 1 W4S T4LK1NG TO H3R H3 JUST K33L3D R1GHT OV3R.  
GC: K4N4Y4 H4S P1CTUR3S 4ND TH3Y 4R3 M4GN1F1C3NT.  
TA: ii2 there really that much for hiim two do  
TA: iit’2 barely even niine  
GC: T1M3 ZON3S, 4PPL3B3RRY!  
GC: BUT Y3S TH3R3 1S 4LSO 4 LOT FOR H1M TO DO.  
GC: TH3 F4CT TH4T H3 H4S F3F3R1’S B4CK1NG L3NDS K4RK4T 4 C3RT41N ST4ND1NG W1TH TH3 M4SS3S, 4S DO3S TH3 F4CT TH4T H3 1S SH4M3L3SSLY US1NG H3R CR3D1T 4CCOUNT TO F33D 4ND CLOTH3 SOM3 OF TH3S3 TROLLS, BUT...  
GC: SOLLUX, 1 TH1NK TH4T 3V3N W1THOUT US, SOM3TH1NG H4D TO G1V3  
GC: TH3Y 4R3 SO 4NGRY  
GC: 4LL OF TH3M  
TA: good  
TA: they 2hould be  
GC: NOT YOU?  
TA: iidgaf tz  
TA: ii thiink we 2orted that ii’m unable two ever giive a fuck, my con2tiitutiion doe2n’t 2upport iit  
GC: S1GH. 4PPL3B3RRY, YOU 4R3 D1STR3SS1NGLY UN1NVOLV3D 1N YOUR OWN FUTUR3. 1T 1S FR4NKLY D1SGUST1NG.  
GC: 1 4M WORR13D TH4T 4N OV3RTHROW H1C 1N1T14T1V3 W1LL SUDD3NLY TURN 1NTO 4N OV3RTHROW TH3 H43MOC4ST3 1N1T14T1V3 4ND TH4T OUR 3NT1R3 G3N3R4T1ON W1LL B3 SYST3M4T1CALLY SL4UGHT3R3D FOR 1T 4ND 1T 4LL D3P3NDS ON K4RK4T B31NG 4BL3 TO K33P TH3 P34CE.  
TA: you’re worryiing two much  
TA: kk’2 entiire liife calliing ii2 two 2top people from fuckiing up  
TA: plu2 there’2 ju2t 2o much happeniing that one or two thiing2 goiing awry ii2n’t goiing two fuck up everythiing ever  
GC: L1K3 YOU KNOW WHAT YOU’R3 T4LK1NG 4BOUT B3TT3R TH4N 4NY OF US  
GC: BUT PO1NT T4K3N 4ND 1 SH4LL ONLY WORRY 4 MOD3R4T3 4MOUNT GO1NG FORW4RD  
GC: OOPS H3 JUST WOK3 UP 4ND 1S 4BOUT TO ST4RT Y3LL1NG 4T M3 FOR L3TT1NG H1M SL33P  
GC: H3R3  
GC is sending file ‘3V1D3NC3.jpg’  
GC: DO TRY TO NOT D3HYDR4T3 YOURS3LF OV3R 1T, 4PPL3B3RRY  
\-- gallowsCalibrator [GC] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --

It’s a very _Terezi_ photo, is the first thing that strikes you when you open the image. It’s exactly the kind of thing you’d expect from a blind girl who ‘sees’ in strokes and impressions of colour. She’s intentionally swept the lens around while taking the photo, resulting in massive blurring, as well as fiddled with focus settings you didn’t think her palmtop even had, and the angle’s weird as hell because she must have been sitting on Pyralspite, but...

...But it’s a photo of KK. He’s walking away from the camera but turned to look back at it, his eyes twin spots of red that Terezi probably salivates over in her more private moments. He’s wearing - something, Kanaya must have made it, a crisp white adult-style uniform with crimson accents that’s nothing like anything you’ve ever seen anybody wear. The moons are low in front of him, backlighting him and making him look like something ethereal, not quite of Alternia, and beyond him is a sea of dark shapes - a _crowd_.

You’re not sure when you stopped breathing, but when you start again it feels like a punch to the gut. KK has been your friend almost since you both first crawled out of the caves, and this is both him and not him, something magnificent gathering around him and using him as its medium. You imagine being there in that crowd and seeing Karkat, probably the first adult any of them have seen, all pristine white and crimson, and your hands ball into fists, your nails slicing into your palms. You’re shaking and you don’t know why, except that your best friend is larger than life and going to cause history’s biggest fucking revolution.

 _Karkat Vantas_ , you think to yourself, and it sounds a lot more important than it used to.

\--

Eridan drops his cape on the floor, which is a bit rich after going off his head at Aradia for using his other cape in an entirely sensible and non-destructive manner, before collapsing into your chair and loosening his scarf. He came from upstairs, which means he must have flown his lusus here, but he looks as tired as if he’d made the journey on foot.

You pick up the cape and drape it over your shoulders. “What do you think?”

Eridan scoffs, a little, but his heart clearly isn’t in it. “I think you’re an asshole. Ray still got my other one?”

“Yeah,” you say, baffled. “ED-”

“I’m tired, Sol,” he says, tilts his head back and closes his eyes. “Some a’ us ain’t manic freaks.”

“Yeah, you’re totally right, I’ve never been _tired_ before,” you snap back, letting the cape drop. You were actually feeling normal for once, instead of at either extreme you usually swing to. “Sorry, ED, I forgot you’re the only one to ever experience basic states of being.”

“Well, if you’re goin’ to be _pissy_ about it,” Eridan says. “I was merely offerin’ an explanation for why I’m not my charmin’ self at the moment.” You’re about to back down because this kind of snark and bite over inconsequential things makes you annoyed, not hateful, but then he opens an eye a little and smirks at you.

You don’t go hot with rage or anything. Instead, you feel detached from your senses as you straddle Eridan’s lap and settle yourself, using the pressure of your presence to make him shut up. It’s still weird, the fact that he leans forward instead of away, that you have a kismesis. Occasionally, in the back of your head, you worry that you don’t hate him enough, that getting fed up with his shit and tripping him over with his own words isn’t _hate_ -hate; then you always tear your brain away from that track and make yourself think that there’s more than one way of doing things, and you’re never disappointed when the situation escalates. If this lasts you’re probably going to be the disgusting kismeses who flirt right up to the edge of making out in public because you can’t stop yourself from responding to his digs - it’s like he’s wrong on the internet, but _worse_ \- and it scares you a little, how okay with that you are.

“As entertainin’ as you tryin’ to distract me with your body is, I did actually come here to talk,” Eridan says too close to your skin, his hands settling on your waist. He doesn’t push you away, but he doesn’t bring you closer, either. “I need backup.”

You place your hands on his shoulders, your fingernails just pricking the edge of his vestigial gills. “I have shit to do that isn’t playing lusus,” you say, and he flinches. You would have missed it if you weren’t so close, if the centimetres between you weren’t so charged. “FLARP?” you ask, in resignation.

He leans closer still, until your foreheads rest against each other and you’re flooded with the urge to bite him to see what happens. “FLARP,” he confirms, and you groan. “Gl’bgolyb needs feedin’!” he protests.

“I know,” you say, and shove down the mental image of the greenblood that you let go back when this all started. “Fuck. I actually can’t, ED, VK and EQ have me running around doing their bidding.”

“So fuckin’ cancel,” he says. “I’d think that genocide is more a concern than _tinkerin_ ’.” He gasps a little; you’ve pushed a little harder with your fingertips against his gills. “Sol, this is a serious conversation, fuckin’ quit tryin’ to stick bits of yourself in me, it’s shameful- what does _Vris_ want with you?”

“A favour,” you say, as dismissively as you can.

Eridan still draws back, killing the moment that was building up. “Wow,” he says, his accent adding insult to the condescension in his tone. “You fucked right up an’ I’m presumin’ you didn’t even get laid for the privilege.”

You tilt your head, an idea suddenly occurring to you. “Do you still have anything on VK?” When he frowns, you nearly hiss in frustration at having to admit, “AA hooked up with her.”

Eridan stares at you, his eyes wide. “What the everlovin’ _fuck_ , Sol? I thought you’d just stopped Ray from gettin’ dead!”

“Yeah, worst moirail ever, I _know_ ,” you say. “You have an _awesome_ track record yourself, so bitch some more. Do you have anything on VK or not?”

“I ain’t had anythin’ on Vris since our partin’ of ways.” He shifts uncomfortably beneath you and it feels flat, all of a sudden, how close you are. The mood is officially ruined. “An’ before you ask, I burned my bridges with her. She ain’t gonna take kindly to me stickin’ my nose in an’ pulling somethin’ ashen.”

“FLARP with her,” you say, in the hopes it will solve both problems.

He stares at you before shaking his head, almost pityingly. It’s saved only by the sheer amount of sneering disbelief he somehow manages to exude. “Vris don’t FLARP now. If I asked she’d laugh in my fuckin’ face an’ rightly so, it’d be like Ter walkin’ up an’ askin’ to start up the Scourge Sister shit again, that is how unlikely things are to be goin’ down.” He shakes his head one more time before adding, “I knew you were shit at observin’ behaviours, but I didn’t think you were this downright stupid.”

“But-” you say.

“Her lusus died, Sol.” Eridan tilts his chin up to stare you dead in the eyes. “What do you think happened afterwards?”

It sinks in, then, that Vriska’s lusus was huge and that letting her go to waste would have been neglectful, compared to the survival of the universe. “Oh,” you say, too little and too late. If you were less of an asshole looking out for your own interests you would have realised it sooner. “Scratch that, then.”

“Yeah,” he says, and only sneers a little. You feel like even more of an asshole for it. “Well, if you can’t do it, what about Ray?” You go very still. So does he, but he keeps talking. “Look, Vris was the danger with FLARP an’ Ray’s gone an’ stuck her foot right in it with her anyway. You know the FLARP I do ain’t dangerous, ‘specially for a veteran like Ray-”

“Anyone else,” you say, and your voice comes out strange and strangled. “We are not starting that shit again, you can fuck right off and beg TV on bended knee, I don’t care, but you are not suckering AA back into FLARPing.”

“Tav ain’t got the drive an’ you know it, Ter’s out a’ town, an’ nobody else would give a single solitary fuck,” Eridan challenges. “Lemme speak to her about it, at least.”

You shake, a little. Just a tremor in your hands.  It takes you two tries to talk, swallowing hard in-between. “She was ash. She was almost dead and it was my hands she was stuck to and you want to start it again-” Your voice goes higher than you want and you cut yourself off. “No.”

“I ain’t startin’ anything between Vris an’ Ray,” Eridan says. “They’re doin’ that themselves. The FLARPin’ is incidental.” He leans back in your chair and folds his arms. “She ain’t gonna die, Sol. The only thing you were in danger of expirin’ from when you came with me was boredom, an’ Ray knows the game better’n you do.” He pauses to consider, then adds, “She does owe me for the cape.”

You consider hitting him in the face. The satisfaction of doing so would be heartily outweighed by how much you suck at throwing a punch, and you know that you’re thinking about punching him because you’ve tried logic and it’s failed, but the idea of Eridan walking around with a broken nub is almost tempting enough to carry through.

“I’ll talk to her about it,” you grind out. Eridan looks surprised, then pleased, and it’s only then that you realise that this debate was at least in part a rivalry thing and that you just _lost_. To _Eridan_. You might as well just go curl up in a hole somewhere to die. “Don’t even,” you say, to forestall any gloating.

He decides to be as unbearable as ever and drapes his arms loosely around your hips. “Not even a little?” His hands edge under your shirt, the sudden chill of his flesh against yours making you jump, and his smirk gets bigger. “It ain’t every day you win an argument with Sollux Captor.” His tone is coaxing and almost pleasant, and you let the feel of it drop into the hollow in your chest where all the best self-loathing comes from. It pulses through you uncomfortably, creating a current under your skin that you can’t get rid of.

You fist your hands in his shirt, aware that this is heading in an entirely different direction but unable to stop yourself from hissing back, “We call it _compromise_ , douchefins.” Before you let yourself stop thinking, you mentally cross your fingers behind your back; telling AA to not FLARP _is_ talking to her about it, technically.


	13. Chapter 13

Eridan sleeps earlier than you do. You guess single-handedly providing lusii for Gl’bgolyb is kind of a hard job, but you still get a little flash of _I could kill him to protect AA_ that you have to viciously stomp on. You don’t think you actually could, for one; at some point you actually got attached to the fucker, and for two you’d definitely be screwing things up forever with KK, and that alone makes the idea not worth it. The easiest path between two points is a straight line, but you’re going to have to find another route.

That said, you crack your knuckles and open up Trollian.

\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has started trolling cuttlefishCuller [CC] --  
TA: hey ff.  
TA: you up?  
CC: Ug)(! I am going to be a-wake FOR-EV----ER wit)( all t)(e reading Eridan )(as me doing!  
CC: W)(at’s wrong?  
TA: ed ha2 you doiing 2tuff?  
CC: 38/ Didn’t you minnow? I t)(oug)(t it was your idea!  
CC: )(e stayed for a little w)(ale after Karcrab left and gave me some advice, and some pointers on fins to read if I wanted to minnow more aboat my Ancestor.  
CC: I )(ate to admit it but )(e was acs)(oally kind of useful! I’m finning aboat asking )(im to be my advisor on )(ig)(blood etiquette and carp, since I )(ave no idea )(ow it all goes.  
TA: ii wa2 about two 2ay two a2k eq but ii thiink he’ll be two bu2y for anythiing that iinvolved. were workiing on a helm2man thiing that miight get you 2ome goodwiill, iidk.  
TA: detaiil2 when ii know what the detaiil2 are.  
TA: you 2hould talk two hiim anyway, he’2 kiind of iin thii2 terriifiied ca2teii2t rut 2iince you and cn are the 2ame ca2te and he ha2 no iidea who two root for.  
CC: I can fix t)(at 3>8)!   
CC: Was t)(at everyfin you wanted? You don’t normeely start the conc)(versoceans!  
TA: ugh wow ii am 2uch a douche, 2orry ff.  
TA: ii wanted two know about gl’bgolyb.  
CC: Gl’bgolyb? W)(y?  
TA: well ed’2 feediing her, riight?  
CC: Yea)(. T)(ere’s nobody eelse I minnow w)(o wouldn’t try tossing )(er poisoned meat or somefin. It doesn’t )(urt )(er, but t)(e last time it )(appened s)(e got reely mad and krilled a bunc)( of rust grubs!  
CC: Kanaya was so angry wit)( me )(er s)(ift key stuck.  
CC: It took me THR-E---E NIG)(TS to calm Mom down enoug)( t)(at t)(e grubs stopped SCR---EAMING 38(.  
TA: fuck  
CC: Quite.  
TA: the thiing ii2 that   
TA: ugh he’2 goiing two kiill me for thii2, let’2 keep iit between u2?  
CC: S)(ore?  
TA: ed’2 been haviing trouble meetiing quota. nobody iin hii2 flarpiing league or whatever iit ii2 wiill play hiim 2iince hii2 kiill2treak ii2 2o hiigh and tho2e that do won’t play hiim alone.  
TA: vk and tv won’t play, tz’2 gone, ii’m bu2y, and everyone left doe2n’t under2tand the concept of a game.  
CC: Except Araydia.  
TA: except aa.  
CC: I don’t minnow w)(at I can do aboat t)(at 38C. I’d offer to play )(alibut Mom gets reely upset if I leave t)(e ocean to do somefin dangerous. S)(e doesn’t efin like me doing too muc)( strife practice.  
CC: I cod talk to )(er, )(alibut s)(e’s alreedy on small rations 38/. T)(ere isn’t anyone else to feed )(er.  
CC: Sometides I wonder if t)(ere ever w)(ale be.  
TA: whoa hold up  
TA: what do you mean by that  
CC: W)(AL--E, t)(e -Empress )(ad a w)(ole army of adults )(unting lusii for Gl’bgolyb, rig)(t? All I )(ave is -Eridan, and after t)(at Isle eit)(er )(ave to recruit adults w)(o’ll probably )(AT----E my guts for daring to TAK---E OV--ER or raise more wrigglers to )(unt lusii.  
CC: I don’t know if I can do eit)(er of t)(ose t)(ings!  
CC: You’ve seen )(ow twisted Eridan and Vriska got. I don’t fin I cod do t)(at to ot)(er trolls.  
TA: so what, you’re goiing two kiill her?  
CC: I don’t know, Solelux!   
CC: S)(e’s my lusus. And I LOV-E )(-ER.   
CC: )(alibut I don’t t)(ink t)(at s)(e can exist in the world I want to create.  
TA: ii  
TA: ii’m 2orry, ff  
CC: Y----EA)(. Me too 38(.  
CC: I don’t minnow if s)(e can efin B----E krilled. It mig)(t all be moot!  
TA: wow  
TA: now ii feel liike an a22hole  
CC: No, I needed to get it off my fins. Karcrab and I were talking aboat it, )(alibut )(e )(asn’t been online lately.  
CC: T)(anks for being my sanding board.  
CC: Maybe Araydia cod just provide backup on the easier missions? T)(at wave Eridan wouldn’t be tired for the )(ard ones, and s)(e’d be mostly out of )(arm’s wave.  
TA: ugh ii gue22   
TA: ii ju2t  
CC: Yea)(.   
CC: -Eridan was my morayeel once, you minnow. I undersand.  
CC: Would it )(elp if I did somefin to take Vriska awave for a w)(ile? I’m preedy s)(ore s)(e can’t acs)(oally disobey a direct order from me.  
TA: nah iit’d ju2t pii22 her off  
TA: thank2 anyway ff  
CC: T)(ank you for undersanding. I’m s)(orey aboat Mom and Araydia 38(.  
TA: our 2ociial group ii2 2o fucked  
CC: Amaseangly fucked!  
TA: FF!!  
CC: W)(at? Karcrab’s rubbing off on me! 3>8)

\--

A few hours later, you’ve run through everyone on your contacts list who’s _anywhere_ near where you are; none of them want the task of feeding the Empress-in-waiting’s lusus, no matter how many favours you throw in. You’re running out of time, you can _feel_ it. Tavros will be moulting soon, if he isn’t already. Then it’ll be you - and you still haven’t decided how to deal with that, you don’t much like the idea of being vulnerable for a week or two - and so on and so forth up the haemospectrum until Feferi moults and shit hits the rotating cooling device. Maybe four seasons, at most. Eight equinoxes, and you’ll need an army. You’ll need to find a way to appeal to all the adults already under the Condesce’s thumb and removed from your location. Karkat and Feferi will need to have the planet’s population well in hand. You and Equius will need to finish your Helmsman project in order to tempt people over, someone will have be appointed to watch over Gl’bgolyb when you actually _ascend_ -

There is no way you can handle all this.

A screwdriver hits you in the shoulder. When you turn, Eridan is half out of the cupe, just enough to have snatched the screwdriver off the floor. Before you can snarl at him, he says, “Get in the cupe, you fuckin’ idiot.”

“I-”

“Get in the fuckin’ cupe or I hit your monitor next.” He sways, under enough soporific influence that you think maybe he meant to hit the monitor the first time and his aim is just hilariously awful at the moment. You look at it one last time before conceding that nothing will change for your worries now, and stand up, pulling your shirt off at the same time.

Eridan ignores the bifurcation of your cupe and pulls you against him - not spooning, exactly, but definitely up in his space - bites your neck almost gently, and says, “You’re a fuckin’ idiot, Sol,” the peaceful repetition of the nearly-asleep. Neck-deep in sopor, lulled and cooled by Eridan, you feel - just barely off edge, like you’ve catalogued your flaws and now you can _work_ on them just as soon as you wake up, like you have a plan even though you don’t - and you slowly fall asleep.

\--

You wake up to warm sopor, which means Eridan must have been out of the cupe for a while. There’s steam coming out of the open door of the ablutions chamber, which you guess solves that mystery. For once, you don’t feel the urge to scramble out of the cupe and scrape off enough sopor that you can sit at your computer without ruining your chair. You decide to indulge yourself for once and shake the slime off your hand, fetch your palmtop, and recline back against the wall of the cupe. It’s not like Eridan’s parting with the ablutions stall any time soon.

\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has started trolling apocalypseArisen [AA] --  
TA: hey favouriite moiiraiil.  
AA: 0_0 i had better be  
AA: whats up  
TA: remember how we 2wore no more flarp?  
AA: and then you played flarp?  
AA: i remember that!  
AA: eridan already talked to me  
TA: ii am goiing two murder hiim. ii am goiing two go iinto the ablutiion2 chamber and make iit look liike an acciident.  
AA: no youre not  
AA: youre still in sopor  
AA: anyway i told him id have to talk to you because im your favourite moirail and all  
TA: for a rea2on obviiou2ly.  
AA: im going to be honest  
AA: i think i should do it  
AA: between having magic brain powers and being a badass robot im pretty indestructible and i dont have much to do since feferi doesnt need me for anything right now  
TA: and what happen2 when you come acro22 a vrii2ka?  
AA: i will be very surprised since vriska doesnt flarp anymore  
AA: you have to admit shes one of a kind  
AA: but i have an even better idea!  
TA: oh god  
TA: maybe ii 2hould eat 2ome of the 2opor and ju2t check out here.  
TA: brb drowniing 2orrow2  
AA: 0_0 v_v 0_0  
AA: that was my eyes rolling  
TA: ffffuck.  
TA: your iidea ii2 tz ii2n’t iit?  
AA: my idea may or may not involve terezi  
TA: well you 2eem to have everythiing 2afely iin hand OH WAIIT II MEAN THE OPPO2IITE OF THAT.  
AA: sollux  
AA: as your favourite moirail i believe i get to explain myself before you flip off the handle  
TA: fiine, but only becau2e my other biitche2 are unavaiilable.  
AA: scheduling with you is just so difficult!  
AA: let me put this kindly  
AA: you suck at people  
TA: thank2 aa that really 2oftened the blow  
AA: youre welcome 0u0  
AA: anyway  
AA: im not really solid on the details yet but if i can convince vriska that she would gain something by following terezi and kanaya then that would free us up a lot here to work with feferi without having to watch our backs constantly  
AA: and the main thing with vriska is that she has to be able to spin her motivations into helping others in her own head  
AA: while actually benefiting her of course  
AA: but im sure she can take care of that part of the logic herself  
TA: there’2 a flaw iin your plan.  
TA: kn, tz, and kk are all perfectly competent wiithout 2omeone el2e along. addiing 2omeone a2 volatiile a2 vk would fuck wiith that.  
TA: and do you really thiink kn would deal wiith haviing vk around after the 2hiit 2he pulled wiith tv?  
TA: not to mention the fact that TZ 2LIICED HER ARM OFF, ii bet 2he’2 2tiill a liittle miiffed about that.  
AA: you know terezi would put her feelings aside if it was for a greater cause  
AA: and kanaya has a blind spot where vriska is concerned  
AA: i dont think its that she thinks she can make vriska better  
AA: but she wants vriska to be better anyway  
TA: and you’re ju2t goiing two throw that piile of emotiional drama at them whiile they’re hiikiing cro22-country?  
AA: i wouldnt if it was all downsides  
AA: but vriska does have an unfortunately large network  
AA: she knows enough hacking to cover her footsteps at least and shes handy in a fight  
AA: and she wouldnt try anything with terezi there  
AA: which is a step up from constantly kicking us in the shins while were trying to work  
TA: oh my god aa don’t 2ay that 2he knows hackiing, that’2 2o lame. iit 2ounds liike a 2hiitty moviie from two cohort2 ago.  
TA: 2trap on the vr goggle2, we’re 2urfiing the darknet!!  
AA: not addressing my points mean that im making good ones and i win 0u0  
TA: ii admiit haviing 2omeone el2e baby2iittiing vk would be niice even iif ii’m not 2ure how clo2e ii want her two kk.  
TA: maybe kn wiill come down wiith a ragiing ca2e of a2hen triike and 2pliit you two up. or maybe tz wiill murder her!!  
TA: maybe ii can briibe them.  
AA: say what you really think sollux  
AA: dont hold back on account of my feelings  
TA: clear iit wiith them before you 2ay anythiing two vk.  
TA: and you only flarp after 2he’2 gone, ii don’t care iif ed’2 bulge fall2 off from overwork at fuckiing people over.  
TA: agreed?  
AA: agreed  
AA: <>  
\-- apocalypseArisen [AA] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --

You’re awake enough now that the sopor has no chance of pulling you back under, which is a pity. After that conversation, you’d like nothing more than to drop back off the radar of consciousness, to throw your hands up and declare that since everyone got themselves in their own fucking messes they can damn well get themselves back out again. The thing that stops you is the countdown that’d been running in your head since Aradia left; you’re running on time borrowed against the inexorable progress of biology, trying to fit seven impossible things where only six will go, and you are going to have to keep making compromises if anything is going to work out.

Plus, in terms of selfishness, Karkat can handle himself when it comes to Vriska, as can Terezi and Kanaya. The further away she is from your moirail, the better for all involved.

Since learning how to breathe slime isn’t an option, you lever yourself out of it instead. The sound of water has shut off, so the ablutions stall should be free unless Eridan has a thing for standing in cubicles. Even if he does, you don’t care. You have a date with hot water and not being sticky that you intend to keep.

He looks at you when you go in, wariness flashing in his eyes; he went behind your back to talk to Aradia about FLARPing, and if he wasn’t correct about you being overly protective and paranoid, you’d have ample reason to rip his head of his shoulders. You don’t fuck with moirails.

You think, grudgingly, for the first time, that he may have talked to Aradia _because_ you are protective and paranoid and - well, he needed something, but at least in this case it made sense to go straight to the source, rather than following etiquette. Highbloods rarely learn life lessons, being presented with them so infrequently, and so you hadn’t believed him when he’d said he was done with Feferi. You still don’t believe it, really; history doesn’t let go like that. But you are willing to concede that maybe he’s learned his lesson about fucking with moirails, which is irritating since it means he actually _is_ trying to be a better person. You’re going to have to stop pissing and moaning and set a proper example if he keeps it up.

“Don’t do it again,” you finally warn him, and get in the stall.

“Fuck you, I do what I want,” he retorts, and goes back to fixing his hair with your one tiny, fogged-up mirror.

\--

After five minutes of scrubbing yourself down and ten of standing under the spray of the ablutions stall, resting your forehead against the glass as you try very hard to think of nothing at all until you feel less sick and resigned, the hot water runs out and you have to rejoin the real world. At some point over the past couple of weeks, the schematics on your body have faded entirely, and you stand there for a very long time with your fingertips just barely grazing your chest, over your heart, as you stare at the mirror and thought comes back to you.

This has been the first time you haven’t been sure that you want to draw them back on.

There have been times when you haven’t worn them - when they faded and you were too lazy to draw them again, mostly - but you’ve always had a piece of them, at least. Usually the jacks along your spine, because you could draw them on in your sleep now and they’re fairly easy to keep hidden. You like the reminder of what’s to come, that the universe doesn’t care how brilliant you are and that it will fuck you over anyway. It’s your cordial nod to the inevitable, while the fact that you’re brilliant anyway is your rebellion. It’s your acknowledgment that They can use you, but that you’re the one who’ll be setting the terms. There are differences between Helmsmen; some adapt well, and others don’t. The schematics are, in sum, your statement that you’d be the former and fuck the Empire if they want a burnt-out slave.

The future seems more nebulous, now. For all that sometimes you feel empty, you don’t feel like a battery waiting to happen, sentient or not.  You may still end up installed in some ship, but for once, it’s possible you might not be.And as much as the realisation is gratifying, it’s also _pants-shittingly terrifying_ as you try to acknowledge it. It’s not the same thing, but Terezi has known she’d be a legislacerator since she was three. Vriska’s so thoroughly embroiled in the black market that any other path seems inconceivable. Eridan’s set up to be some Captain, embroiled in highblood politics where they’ll make sad and sympathetic noises about his genocide attempts not working, Equius is likely to end up a commander of a ship, Gamzee a priest of the mirthful. You never conceived of having a different career trajectory; that shit’s for people who can’t be used by the Empire.

If Feferi manages to pull this coup off, it’s going to be a lot more groundbreaking than you originally realised. The idea of not being used by the Empire is so startlingly new to you that you have to keep pressing yourself against its edges and hold it in your thoughts so it doesn’t slip away. It is going to cut you, one day, but in all fairness, what doesn’t?

You look at your skin, smooth, unbroken grey, then you shrug on a shirt and pull on some pants, shove your glasses on, and leave the ablutions chamber feeling like a troll instead of a tool.

Eridan is waiting for you in your chair, one foot resting on the opposite knee and his rifle balanced across his lap as he cleans it. Weapons aren’t your thing, so you’re not sure why a rifle that shoots lasers needs cleaning, but evidently it does. Perhaps not badly, though, since when he sees you he hastily reassembles the weapon before stowing it in his strife deck.

“So, FF,” you say, and slouch against the doorframe. You’re going to have to buy another chair. Maybe you can make one out of old cases instead, you have enough of them lying around and your credit still hasn’t recovered from the case of Vriska it came down with. “She said you were advising her.”

“And?” he says, raising an eyebrow. “You already got a moirail, Sol.”

You’re not much, physically. Certainly nothing to threaten Eridan, who you’ve seen shoot Ahab’s Crosshairs with one hand while holding onto his lusus with just his legs. That doesn’t stop you from leaning in and letting your eyes spark. Your advantages have always been brain over brawn. “And you _don’t_.” Before he can protest, you press a hand over his mouth. “You get that you fucked up with FF, I get it. You’re over it, I believe less, but fine. If you’re not being honest with yourself, though - and let’s just admit that you’re a fucking sack of self-delusion and entitlement deep down and save us some time - if you’re not honest about that, and you try to get FF back flushed and force her hand and _fuck everything up_ , I will help her bury the body and wipe your records and come up with a polite lie to tell Karkat, got it?”

He blinks, behind his glasses. Then he inclines his head, fractionally. When you take your hand away, he asks, very quietly, “Do you think I’d do that to Kar?” It isn’t accusatory, but hollow; asking the expert on his failures how likely he is to fail.

You let the extra sparks die off before answering. “It depends.” When he glares at you, you raise your hands in a shrug. “I fuck you, I’m not your moirail. If I knew what you were going to do, I wouldn’t have to warn you.” You fold your arms before saying, reluctantly, “If it’s going to be a problem, then you’re going to need a moirail who can deal with it or to cut yourself off. I don’t _want_ to have to be party to your murder.”

He shakes his head before standing. “You’re a piece a’ work, Captor.” Then, to your utter surprise, he grabs you by the horn and kisses you, his teeth grazing your lower lip. Between the soothing from your horn and the sharp pressure on your lip, your body doesn’t know what to do, and your legs sag even as you dig a hand into his hair so you can bring him down with you. Before it advances any further, though, he lets you go and presses a kiss to your cheek that would be chaste, if you weren’t both flushed and panting. “You ain’t goin’ to be party to my horrific murder,” he promises, not with pride but with something quieter and determined, the same Eridan who ripped his cape in half to prove a point and accidentally took your pitch quadrant with it. He backs away a couple steps before nodding and sweeping out, his current cape flicking at his heels.

The click of the doorlatch snaps you back into the real world, and you collapse into your chair, still in half a daze. You don’t have time for all this hormone shit, there’s plotting to be done that isn’t going to do itself.

\--

\-- gallowsCalibrator [GC] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --  
GC: C4N 1 NOT L34V3 YOU 4LON3 FOR ON3 W33K  
GC: 1N 4LL HON3STY, MY W4N 4ND T4NGY D4RL1NG, 1F YOU W3R3 F33L1NG N3GL3CT3D 1 WOULD R4TH3R H4V3 R3C31V3D 4 F4C3FUL OF B33S 4G41N 1NST34D OF 4 S3RK3T  
GC: K4N4Y4 T3LLS M3 TH4T TH1S S3ND 4N OLD T3RR1BL3 FL4M3 4LONG 4ND TH3N PR3V3NT 4 BONF1R3 TH1NG 1S V3RG1NG ON CL1CH3 4ND YOU KNOW 1 DONT 4PPR3C14T3 TH1NGS TH4T T4ST3 ST4L3  
TA: diid aa tell you that 2he and vk hooked up?  
GC: Y3S >:[ TH1S 1S 4 T3RR1BL3 S1TU4T1ON 4ND 1 4M TRY1NG V3RY H4RD TO NOT TH1NK 4BOUT HOW HOT 1T W4S TH4T 4R4D14 B34T TH3 CR4P OUT OF VR1SK4 B4CK 1N TH3 T3RR1BL3 T1M3S  
TA: tz we were 2iix.  
GC: MY S3XU4L1TY W4S BLOSSOM1NG 4ND 1 ST1LL H3LD V3RY DUB1OUS NOT1ONS OF K1SM3SS1TUD3  
GC: 4LSO 1 F1GUR3D 1 W4S GO1NG TO B3 CULL3D 4NYW4Y SO 1 M1GHT 4S W3LL F1ND SOM3 B34T UP CYBORG G1RLS HOT  
TA: the2e are thiing2 that ii don’t need two know. thii2 ii2 pretty much the defiiniitiion of thiing2 ii don’t need two know.  
TA: iif ii ever need two know ii wiill apply two kk for the requii2iite go22iip fiile2, at whiich poiint ii wiill make a 2peciial poiint of burniing them afterward2 a2 a clean2iing riitual.  
GC: SOM3 OF US H4PP3N TO H4V3 TYP3S!  
GC: 4T L34ST M1N3 1S NOT SNOOTY H1GHBLOOD D3STRUCTOZO1DS  
TA: de2tructozoiid2? really?  
GC: 1 H4V3 M4D3 4N 4CCUR4T3 C4LL 4ND 1 4M ST1CK1NG W1TH 1T.  
TA: whoa full 2top and everythiing, you are all over that call.  
GC: TH1S C4LL 1S L1K3 HOT CYBORG B4B3S, TH4T 1S HOW OV3R 1T 1 4M  
GC: NOT TO M3NT1ON ST1CKY  
GC: >:] > :] >:]  
TA: ugh urgh blurgh.  
GC: NON3TH3L3SS 1 DONT W4NT VR1SK4 W1TH US  
GC: SH3 W1LL TH1NK 1T WOULD BE FUNNY 1F SH3 ST4RT3D M1NDCONTROLL1NG K4RK4T DUR1NG TH3 M1DDL3 OF ON3 OF H1S SP33CHES  
TA: then drag her out on 2tage and execute her.  
TA: tz?  
GC: 1 DONT TH1NK 1 COULD  
TA: yeah.  
TA: ok. let me tell aa.  
GC: 1 S41D 1 DO NOT W4NT H3R H3R3  
GC: HOW3V3R 1T WOULD S4DLY B3 TH3 B3ST P4TH   
GC: 1 D1DNT W4NT TO M3NT1ON 1T BUT W3V3 H4D 4 F3W CLOS3 C4LLS W1TH S3CUR1TY  
GC: TURNS OUT TH4T CULL TH3 MUT4NT 1S 4S POPUL4R 4 G4M3 4S 3V3R 4ND H4V1NG VR1SK4 R34DY 4ND 4BL3 TO FR33Z3 TH3M OUT WOULD B3 US3FUL  
GC: 4ND 4S MUCH 4S 1 H4T3 H3R  
GC: PL4TON1C4LLY!  
GC: 1 C4R3 4BOUT K4RK4T MOR3  
TA: hey tz?  
GC: S1GH  
GC: 4SK  
TA: fiine ii wiill, thank2 for the permii22iion.   
TA: why diidnt iit work out between you and kk?  
GC: B3C4US3 W3 W3R3 YOUNG 4ND DUMB 4ND 1 4M CH4RG3D TO GU4RD 4ND GU1D3 H1M  
GC: 1 WOULD R4TH3R H3 H4V3 M3 4T H1S B4CK FOR3V3R TH4N 1N H1S QU4DR4NTS FOR 4 SW33P OR TWO 4ND TH3N GON3 WH3N H3 N33D3D M3  
GC: 1S TH4T SUFF1C13NT SOUL-SH4R1NG, 4PPL3B3RRY?  
TA: you know, 2ometiime2 ii can’t hate you.  
GC: NONS3NS3  
GC: YOU H4T3 M3 FOR S3TT1NG 4 FL4WL3SS 3X4MPL3  
GC: SOM3T1M3S 1 H4T3 M3 FOR S3TT1NG 4 FL4WL3SS 3X4MPL3  
GC: 1T 1S MY ON3 V1C3 4ND 1 4M V3RY PROUD OF 1T  
TA: ii don’t want two leave you alone wiith her.  
GC: JO1N TH3 CLUB.  
GC: G3T 1T, TH3 CLUB?  
TA: get the fuck off the iinternet riight now oh my god  
GC: 1 KNOW, 1 4M S1MPLY TOO H1L4R1OUS FOR M3R3 D4T4 P4CK3TS TO CONTA1N  
GC: 1 W1LL B3 F1N3, SOLLUX. TH3R3 1S SOM3TH1NG 4BOUT HOLD1NG 4 G1RL DOWN 4S YOUR FR13ND BO1LS OUT H3R 3Y3 TH4T 1S K1ND OF 4 BULG3K1LL.  
GC: 1 M34N 1 COULDN’T S33 1T, BUT TH3 SM3LL M4D3 M3 HUNGRY. TH3R3 1S S1MPLY NO COM1NG B4CK FROM TH4T.  
GC: SH4LL W3 S3T UP TH3 R3ND3ZVOUS?  
TA: actually  
TA: ii have 2ome coordiinate2

\--

You left the convincing of Vriska up to Aradia, because you don’t know and you don’t care when it comes to getting involved in a game of manipulation with the originator of the term. Two nights later, you’re outside the city limits and squinting at the map on your palmtop, trying to turn terrain and weather into a feasible flight path. You’ve never made such a long trip before, but you’re hoping you can be there and back in a couple of nights; being stuck out in the open holds no appeal to anyone who isn’t courting a cull when the weather turns.

Vriska lopes up to the meeting place twenty minutes late, a backpack slung over one shoulder and cardboard cup steaming against the cold air. You were banking on her being late anyway, but it’s still incredibly tempting to slap the cup out of her hand. Instead of greeting you, or anything remotely resembling civilised behaviour, she crowds against your shoulder to look at your palmtop before slurping her coffee.

“I hope you have room for that in your bag,” you say, and continue tapping out a flight path.

Vriska snorts. “Like you can’t burn up the trash.” She drains the cup before scrunching it up and tossing it over her shoulder, and smirks when you burn it to ash. “You know, Sol, the whole reason I gave _you_ the coordinates was so that I wouldn’t have to check them out!”

You keep your eyes fixed on your screen. “Yeah, well, I can’t tell good metal from crap, so consider it a business expense. It’s on the way, anyway.”

\--

You move too fast for conversation. The wind tears words away and you’re glad, because not only are you too busy holding as aerodynamic a profile you can with your psionics, but you really do not feel like talking to Vriska. Not even to try to understand the whole mess she and Aradia have declared themselves to be in. You can feel Vriska in your horns, a nebulous cloud that occasionally tries to hook into you whenever you have to adjust your course by dropping rapidly, which may be more often than necessary once you realise those hooks are there because she’s _nervous_. She doesn’t look it, slouching against your psionic tow-ropes, but Vriska has reason to dislike being at your mercy.

The first hour in, she taps at your shoulder. You slow down enough that you can hear her.

“Lemme go!” she says, over the rush of wind that circles you both.

You look down – _very_ down – and back up at her before raising your eyebrow. She rolls her eyes before pointing at her feet; at some point she must have equipped her rocket boots, gaudy red and gold. Then again, you’re not over anywhere but empty countryside, and there’s a lot of flying left to do. You let go.

Vriska drops for a long moment before her boots sputter into life and she shoots upwards, a trail following her like she’s a comet. She whoops as she climbs past you, leaving you with the taste of exhaust and the knowledge of what it feels like to be Terezi. She knocks down the power and hovers above you, shouting something that you don’t catch.

“What?” you yell back.

She drops to your level, where you can almost actually hear each other, and says, “It’s on!” You barely process what she’s said before she ramps up her boots and is gone, leaving you well in her wake.

Well, there _is_ still a lot of flying to do. You gather your power and slam it out and back, leaving red and blue streams of light as the miles race away below you.

\--

Despite Vriska running out of rocket fuel ten hours in, you make it to the rendezvous point early. The carcass of a ship towers above you, weathered down and rusted along the edges that have broken apart, but still entirely too whole for your liking. You want nothing more than to collapse to your knees and guzzle as much water as you can, but Vriska’s wrenched open one of the smaller access ports and gone in before you get the chance to fall over and go to sleep. You’re going to need to build up your endurance if you’re going to be making cross-country flights on the regular.

You follow Vriska in, unsteady on your feet. Cold, stark metal bounces the light of the torch that Vriska pulled out right into your eyes, and you have to squint against it. You almost don’t notice Vriska looking back at you before she yanks a panel off the wall and sticks her head in.

“Could probably salvage some of the wiring, too,” she says, her voice echoing down the corridor, long past you. “Sol, if you’re gonna be my agent, you have to know what to look for! Get in here.”

You have seen enough horror movies to know how this goes, but you stick your head through the wall of the ship anyway. There’s a mess of wiring back there, but not- not any biowires. Where the living inorganic should connect to the plain wires, they drop off into tangles and snarls.

“Where-” you say, before stopping. Vriska looks at you, her robotic eye lit up in the darkness. “It’s only half a ship,” you say, your words swallowed by gloom and wires and secrets you don’t know.

“Yeah,” she says, turning back to the wires and reaching up into them. “Like a whole ship would do me any good! This one’s so old that everything’s rotted away and left the _good_ bits for me.” She yanks on a cluster of wires and they come loose, showering the both of you in dust. You brush it off and try to not think about what you’re inhaling. “Anyway, look at these wires,” Vriska says, unperturbed. “The casing’s still whole and hasn’t melted or anything, so the wires are probably still fine. I know a guy who’ll strip ‘em and melt ‘em down for me, so let me know if it’s like this on any of the other ones.”

Still too busy not thinking about what happened to the ship, you say, “Yeah,” a beat too late as the both of you lean back out of the wall. Vriska shoves the cluster of wires back in before leaning the panel approximately where it was and continuing down the hallway. She walks like she knows where she’s going and you wonder how many times she’s done this. It’s not exactly like you’ve kept track of her doings, since everything.

“VK-”

“Relax, Sol!” She finds a staircase and jogs down it without bothering to test her weight. You opt to float instead. “The Helmsblock’s not going to be functional, I just want to check it out.”

You think of the dust of wires and pull a face. “I _know_. And you can quit that line, alright? I’m not afraid of being batteried.”

“Coulda fooled me!” She reaches the bottom of the stairs and swings the light around. There are computer banks crammed up against the walls, arrayed and decayed, older than you’ve ever seen outside of schoolfeeding research. Vriska whistles, impressed. “Reckon I can sell a few to Eridan as antiques?”

You snicker, before you can help yourself. When she flicks her eyes to you in surprise, a momentary lapse before she looks away and walks towards the door at the back of the room, you want to slap yourself. This is how Vriska works. Everything she is is one big act, a manipulation. If Terezi were here she’d be someone entirely different, and you are the highest degree of idiot to not remember that.

“Little help, flyboy!” she calls, and you follow after her. The door is keycard-controlled, but with the ship in the state it is, that’s obviously not going to happen. You hope fervently for a distinct lack of traps and slice through the edges with psi. As soon as you’re done, Vriska pushes the door down, and it hits the floor with a dust-muffled clang.

The Helmsblock looks empty without the biowires. You take a couple of steps into the room before halting, Vriska uncharacteristically silent. All the wiring channels are visible without the wires in the way, the ceiling of the room peppered with holes that serve to route wiring off to the rest of the ship.  The support column in the centre seems thin and brittle without the customary thick column of fuchsia wrapped around it.

“You were saying?” Vriska prompts, circling the room in the other direction, one hand pressed against the wall.

You snap out of your dreams of wires and look at her. “I was just wondering why you’ve been doing all this shit.”

“Irons in the fire, Sol,” she says, and knocks against a wall. It booms back, hollow.

“Useful, thanks,” you say, and resign yourself to never understanding Vriska Serket. Not that you ever would, but you need all the insight you can get.

She pulls up short and meets your eyes, a slow and lazy smirk hooking up the corner of her mouth. “Get in the pillar and I’ll tell you,” she offers, and waves her palmtop. “I’ll even take pictures.”

Goosebumps break out over your arms. You force yourself to stand very still and not shudder, or rub your arms, or anything that would give you away. “There’s nothing there to get into,” you say, from a long way away.

Vriska’s smirk gets bigger, if anything. “And you’d know, wouldn’t you?” She makes a small gesture with one hand, from you to the support column. “This is the culmination of every sad little fantasy you’ve ever had, right?”

“Fuck,” you mutter. It’s one thing to be the Helmsbait freak. It’s another thing entirely for everyone to know you’re the Helmsbait freak, and possibly not being the Helmsbait freak anymore is the cherry on top of this cake. “Did AA tell you?”

“Equius did. He’s _very_ conflicted over you.” She shrugs. “But we were talking about me. Do you want to know or not?”

You’re curious, you have to admit. It’s a failing of yours and you will readily own up to it. “I swear to fuck, VK, if you’re fitting me up for a Helmsblock-”

“Oh my _god_ ,” she says, drawing it out with an exaggerated roll of her eyes. “I get it, Sol, really! The world will fuck me over if I Helm you, so I ain’t planning to Helm you! I just thought I’d give you the opportunity to live out your sick needs and feel like you were being useful. I don’t _judge_.” She wraps an arm around your shoulders and it’s too cold. “You’ve been staring at it since you walked in,” she adds, and then, “I could make you, if _that’s_ your thing.”

You recoil in horror and- clamp down before you can lash out, escalating the situation is not a good idea- choke out, “That is _not_ ‘my thing,’ _fuck_.” You uncurl your fingers one by one and breathe through your nose. “The whole thing is that it’s my choice,” you say, more to yourself than to her, because Vriska never listens. “Not that you’d understand.”

“Oh yeah, not at all!” Vriska layers her words with sarcasm so heavily you’re surprised they made it out of her mouth. “Well, whatever, get up on the pole or not. I thought it’d be more interesting than just waiting around for Miss Sniffnodes, that’s all!”

You force every muscle in your body to relax before you take a step towards the support column, and another.  For all that Vriska is poisonous, she isn’t wrong. You’ve been curious ever since you can remember, about what it would be like to be a Helmsman, physically. You’re not cutting limbs off or implanting new nerves in yourself, but this is a little piece of it that you can break away and pull into your understanding.

The support column looks kind of like a spine with long, spindly arms extending from each vertebra for the wires to twine around as they grow, so the pillar can support its own weight. You boost yourself up to the proper height and place the column to your back, wedge your feet into the wireholds and grab onto more above your head, as high as you can reach. You’re still too small for a helmsblock; unmoulted, underdeveloped, you couldn’t fit all the jacks on you right now if you tried, but a shudder runs through you at how real this feels nonetheless. This ship might be older than any ancestor you have and missing all the important pieces, but here and now, it’s enough. You open your eyes.

The wall is grey. You look around, as much as you can, and all that’s there is grey and Vriska, who at least is looking at you with an expression you might almost call impressed. Your arms ache, your back twinges, your legs stretch too far and hurt for it. This is life inside a helmsblock.

Sure, there’d be cameras. There’d be all the internet you could handle, once you broke through the blocks, and you have at least six plans ready for breaking conditioning should it ever be necessary. There’d be the challenge of navigating space, avoiding debris that can’t be seen with the naked eye and calculating your way through complex gravity fields. But there would also be this grey, and loneliness, and forgetting that you’d ever craved Aradia’s touch, and inevitably making yourself too valuable to die.

If there is one thing you have never wanted, this sad immortality is it. It scares you, bleak and too close for comfort.

“So did you want a picture to remember your very first time in a Helmsblock?” Vriska asks.

You’re about to say no and drop back to the floor when you hesitate. It’s not like you won’t remember this, but you know yourself. Five minutes away, a touch of depression, and you’ll crave the certainty of the helmsblock. First-hand evidence will help you remember just how shitty it actually is up here.

“Fine,” you say. Vriska’s eyebrows rise alarmingly, but she takes a quick snap before prodding uncertainly at her phone as you drop to the floor. “You right?” you ask, suspicious.

“Yeah, I just got a new version of Trollian is all.” Your palmtop goes off, alerting you to the file transfer. “There!”

“Delete the file,” you say, once it’s transferred. “And I believe you owe me.”

“Done.” Vriska shows you her palmtop before shoving it into her back pocket. “You’ve always felt like you’re meant to be a Helmsman, right?”

“Something like that,” you mutter, unwilling to get into the deepest, darkest cracks of your pan with a psychopath. “What about it?”

“So you’re not the only one who feels like they should be something.” Vriska strides out of the helmsblock, leaving you to scramble after her. “It’s the whole reason I’m helping you guys out with this thing, but I guess you and Megido don’t talk as much as everyone thinks you do!”

“It’s to stop me from murdering you for her safety,” you retort, placid. Now that you’ve caught up you can keep pace, and you stay over-casual about it. You suddenly regret your determination to understand Vriska Serket. You still don’t like her, you still have not and will not forgive her, but you have the sinking sensation that you are going to see her as a troll after this, which means it will be a lot harder to kill her if things come down to that. “So what should you be?”

Vriska turns a corner and stops. It’s the hallway you entered the ship by, and Terezi stands silhouetted against the sky through the hole you climbed through, Pyralspite behind her. “Free,” she says, and there is no colour at all in her voice.


	14. Chapter 14

You stay the day in the hollowed-out ship, too nervous to sleep with Vriska around. Terezi is awake, too, and you can tell she’s tracking your footsteps by the way she turns her head to follow you. It’s disturbing, in someone blind.

“Quit pacing,” she says, after your third expedition to the far side of the room. It must have been the Captain’s block, though you have no idea how Vriska was able to find it. Everything is dust. Even the sopor in the cupe has decayed into powder, which Terezi has to stop Vriska from sticking in her mouth.

You wonder if any of the dust used to be walking and talking. It seems probable. This was obviously a re-entry crash, and you can see ancient marks where fire ravaged the ship. And if there was a fire, that means that anyone in the crash was much less likely to get out of it, which means that they’re probably stuck to the bottom of your shoes. It should make you less willing to walk around, but you think that whoever used to occupy this ship is beyond caring.

“Sorry,” you say, and force yourself to sit down next to her. Over in the far corner, Vriska shifts under a blanket Terezi thought to bring, and you tense.

Terezi lays a hand on your shoulder. “She’s asleep.”

“You’d know,” you say, and forcibly relax yourself, sliding down the wall a little. It’s too cold, with your back against metal and your side against a tealblood, but you will have to deal. “How’s KK?”

Terezi knocks you in the arm with her shoulder. “I think you mean ‘how are you, Terezi,’ because surely you would not be so uncouth as to ignore the wellbeing of the lady in front of you.”

“How are _all of you_?” you amend. Terezi shuffles closer to you - or more accurately, to your warmth - and you slide an arm around her, because the other options are to get stabbed with her elbows or drubbed by her cane until you give in anyway. You’re still a smidge taller than her, and from this angle you can see the faint red sheen of her eyes, like the scleral lenses they use in shitty horror movies. She never displayed much emotion before the accident, but now she’s a blank page unless you catch her in one of these quieter moments.

She thinks for a while, her arms wrapped loosely around her knees, her cane by her other side.  “Karkat is getting used to it, as much as he can,” she says, eventually. “It is a very strange life that he has stumbled into, but for all he goes on and on about how much he hates his ancestor, it is almost as if he sees the entire thing as his birthright.” After another long moment, your breaths coming frozen into the air - the ship is still well-insulated, you have to give it that - she adds, “He sees it as a problem to set right.”

“Maybe he’s not wrong,” you say, thinking of your feet and hands wedged into the spinal column of the ship. Anyone olive and below has their hands tied in one way or another.

“As _his_ problem to right, personally.” For one of the few times since you have known her, since she was blinded and marked for culling, Terezi shows weakness. She pushes up her glasses and rubs at her eyes, looking very tired all of a sudden. She has always been too driven to look _tired_ , and it sets off a worried, loathsome subroutine in your heart. You want her to be _better_ than midday rendezvous in burnt-out spaceships, chasing after Vriska Serket. “This - everything - is too big to _stop_ , Sollux. He is going to kill himself trying, if Kanaya doesn’t first.”

“Kanaya?” you ask.

Terezi sighs. “To be frank, even if Pyralspite were not my lusus, I would have volunteered to pick up Vriska just to get away from them. Kanaya keeps fussing over Karkat and Karkat is unused to the fussing and I would honestly not be surprised if I come back to find one of them has poisoned the other through syrupy words alone. I would think she was trying to take Karkat ash, if either of them had any kismessitude prospects.”

You look over your glasses, significantly, at Vriska.

“Bluh,” Terezi says, and smacks you in the ribs. “You know Kanaya wouldn’t consider someone already taken, and Karkat, well.” She bites on her lip, reluctantly. “I don’t think he’s considered the issue at all. When he does talk about quadrants, it’s Eridan, Eridan, Eridan.”

“Tell him to get online and actually _talk_ to ED.” You yawn, lulled by Terezi’s leeching of your body heat. You still don’t think you could sleep, but you’re getting more tired. “I’m getting sick of the Karkat, Karkat, Karkat.”

Terezi snorts. “New pity.”

“Sickening,” you agree, and decide to not mention the argument over Feferi. For all Terezi is your auspice, and Eridan is your kismesis, it’s his shit to deal with for the moment. “So what’s up with KN, then?”

Terezi strokes the head of her cane, down by her side, and you don’t think she even realises she’s doing it. “She misses home,” she finally says. “I think this may be the first time she has been torn between obligations, and quite possibly the first time she has left her lusus on its own. We’ll be passing her home, eventually. Perhaps by then she will be convinced that she can stay there, or that it’s safe to venture away.” There’s a slight downward curve to her lips and an almost-imperceptible drawing together of her eyebrows that you wouldn’t have noticed, were she not right next to you. Terezi is sick to death of the two of them, enough so that Vriska is actually a valid option for relieving their cabin fever.

“You know, if you want,” you say, and trail off, embarrassed. She arches an eyebrow at you (well, at your chin, but it counts, you think), and you sigh. “I was going to say that if you wanted to bitch at them to quit it, I wouldn’t mind, but it’s not like my opinion matters.” Terezi manages to put into a silence the feeling of the calm before storm, and you stutter, “I mean - yeah it _matters_ , but it’s up to _you_ , fuck.”

She sighs, the tension broken, and leans her head on your shoulder. “You’re worth more to me than you know, Appleberry. Permission to bitch noted.”

“I get that a lot.” Strangely, painfully protective, you shift until your shoulder isn’t digging into her ear. “Get some rest, TZ. You’ll need it.”

“Lies,” she says, but obligingly makes herself comfortable anyway.

\--

You don’t go wandering off during the day, because seriously, _horror movies_ , but it’s tempting. Terezi would smack you, though, and you’d even likely deserve it for once. Instead, you’re stuck being her pillow and tracking the minute changes in temperature over the course of the day, as the sun outside finally has some effect on the metal monstrosity you’re all trapped within.

Vriska wakes up before Terezi does, which makes sense given the shadows under Terezi’s eyes. You didn’t think her roadtrip would be _easy_ , but you hadn’t expected it to be so full-on, either. Not full-on enough to bring down Terezi, anyway, who has always had as much energy as a rubber band stretched to its full potential.

You expect Vriska to say something, or wake Terezi up by throwing something, but instead she just looks at the two of you before shaking her head and pulling her palmtop out of her pocket. You don’t think even Vriska would try anything; with Terezi _and_ you here, she’s not likely to find the odds favourable, but she’s the most interesting thing in this room and so you watch her, your eyes half-closed and your head leaned back against the wall.

Your palmtop vibrates in your pocket. Vriska gives you a look, one eyebrow arched, until you dig it out with your free hand and look at what she has to say.

\-- arachnidsGrip [AG] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   
AG: Enjoying the show, Captor?   
TA: ii already regret lookiing at trolliian.   
TA: why aren’t you wakiing tz up?   
AG: I have communic8ions to take care of! I think we can agree that Pyrope needs her 8eauty sleep in the meantime.   
TA: thii2 whole vk-con2iideriing-the-need2-of-other2 thiing ii2 creepy a2 fuck.   
TA: what’2 goiing on, and don’t giive me 2ome turned over a new leaf bull2hiit.   
AG: Ugh, you’re so cynical!   
AG: May8e I just feel sorry for Pyrope! She’s running around the world at your 8eck and call and it’s pretty o8vious she’s over whatever situ8ion you and Vantas have cooked up.   
AG: At the very least, she could do with another couple hours of sleep, and it 8n’t like watching you pretend your arm’s not dead isn’t hilarious.   
TA: wtf.   
TA: no don’t even an2wer that ju2t   
TA: you are NOT ALLOWED two 2tiill have feeliing2 for tz iif that’2 what you’re 2ayiing and ii hope two hell you’re not.   
TA: becau2e that ii2 2iick.   
AG: I get it already, sheeeeeeeesh. God fucking forbid the scary ex-murderer has feelings, right?   
TA: you’re tryiing two guiilt me and iit’2 not workiing.   
AG: I 8n’t a8out to get all wo88ly for Pyrope, cool it. It’d take a drone 8anging on the door for me to get on that.   
AG: It’s just 8een a while since we were in the same room and it wasn’t as enemies, alright? Lay off me for getting sentimental in my old age 8ecause I missed that.   
TA: oh my fliippiing fuck, vk, do you expect me to buy thii2 2hiit?   
TA: you miindcontrolled me iintwo kiilliing aa.   
AG: Shrug.   
TA: II CAN FUCKIING 2EE YOU, YOU DON’T HAVE TWO TYPE 2HRUG.   
AG: Calm your tits, Captor! Yeah, alright, I used you to get 8ack at Megido, and I shouldn’t have. Is that what you wanted?   
TA: fuck you, vk. thii2 ii2n’t me wantiing crap and you’re fucked iin the pan for thiinkiing iit ii2.    
TA: ii want aa two not be half alumiiniium and tiitaniium. ii want tz two not be bliind. ii want you two never have fucked each and every one of u2 over per2onally wiith a fuckiing 2miile on your 2hiit-eatiing face.   
AG: Look, I get what you’re saying, alright? It may come as a surprise, 8ut it’s not like I enjoy 8eing a complete pariah 8ecause of things that happened when we were six! Having all that hanging over your head is RE8L FUN, let me tell you!   
AG: 8ut whatever. I 8n’t even trying to make amends, 8ecause apparently that shit 8n’t enough.  You do you, Sol, and as soon as I can afford to 8ri8e my way clear of you lot, I’ll do me, and we’ll never have to fucking see each other again and I can stop paying for the mistakes I made when I was six fucking sweeps old and had a lusus to feed.   
TA: yeah and ii’d beliieve that iif you hadn’t 2educed aa and weren’t gettiing all fluttery over tz.   
AG: Hey, Sol, look up so I can roll my eyes at you.   
AG: Rooooooooll!   
AG: Your ro8orail hit on me, dum8ass! I 8n’t gonna turn down a free ticket past the drones.   
AG: If it’ll make you feel 8etter, consider her dumped on Ascension.   
TA: ugh what ii2 iit wiith aa and thiing2 ii don’t need two know.   
TA: iit’2 your bu2iine22, whatever. ju2t don’t expect me to tru2t you.   
AG: Wow, 8n’t that something? I don’t!   
AG: Just sick of 8eing raked through the mud 8y you and yours.    
TA: fiine   
AG: Fine!!!!!!!!   
\-- arachnidsGrip [AG] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] –

Vriska rolls over onto her stomach and props herself up on her elbows as she fiddles with her palmtop, coincidentally turning her face away from you. After a moment. one of her hands comes up to scrub at her eyes; you do not believe it for a second, except for the part where Vriska _would_ make herself feel victimised over the fallout of trying to murder people. You hope Terezi can keep her in line without making herself hurt too badly. You hope this was the right decision, not just for Alternia and Feferi – now that you can work in peace – but for everyone you hold selfishly close to your heart who this will effect; Karkat and Aradia, Terezi, even Kanaya, albeit as more of a reflexive guilty apology for siccing Vriska on her in the first place.

It depends on Vriska. If she means what she says and just wants to be left alone, you’ll all be fine. If she wants to make life messy for any of you before Ascension, the combined forces of your social group will crush her. It’s that simple.

Well, you hope it’s that simple. You suspect that in practice, it isn’t.

\--

By the time Terezi wakes up, it’s night proper and you can’t put off leaving any longer if you want to get back to your hivestem at any reasonable hour. It might even be better to aim for KK’s and crash there for the next day; your psionics aren’t going to be thanking you for one long flight after another, and a proper recuperacoon would probably go a long way towards making amends.

Oh well, whatever. You’ll have plenty of time to decide mid-flight.

Pyralspite waits outside, settled comfortably onto a flattish plane of rocks that probably hold the day’s warmth better than your ship did. She picks up her head when she hears your footsteps and only settles again when Terezi places a hand on her snout and whispers something that you can’t hear. Vriska approaches Pyralspite like she approaches most things that aren’t irons in fires; sideways, cautiously, and sulking about the necessity of the action. Only when she’s satisfied that the dragon isn’t going to bite her other arm off does she scramble up onto Pyralspite’s back.

Terezi lowers her glasses and peers sightlessly at you over the top of them. “Yet again, I escape your reach.”

“Yeah, the Captor jokes never get old,” you say. You step closer hesitantly, then glance at Vriska before pulling Terezi into a loose hug. She goes stiff in your arms; for all that she’ll happily sleep on your shoulder, you’ve never really been the full-bodied hugging types. “If you need to get her away from you,” you say quietly enough that Vriska won’t hear, so close to Terezi’s ear that your lips brush her hair, “troll me. Call me, even. If this was a bad idea, we can scrap it.”

“No takebacks,” Terezi says, before prodding you in the stomach with her cane. “Stop being demonstrative, you oaf, I have a dragon to ride and villages to pillage.”

You let her go and back away as she climbs up onto Pyralspite. Vriska wriggles her fingers at you in a cheerful wave before Pyralspite takes off; you watch them turn into a blob in the distance before sighing and kicking off in the opposite direction. If Vriska ends up murdered for being annoying, that solves problems too.

\--

You’re more tired than you can really fathom by the time you stagger to the ground in front of KK’s hive. The only reason you didn’t crash in through a window was because it’s probably rude to break your best friend’s hive, and even now you can barely muster up enough energy to slap your hand against the scanner by the door.  It hisses open after a long minute or two, and you make a dull mental note to upgrade his shit; there’s no reason a dumb fingerprint recognition should take that long, especially since his database probably only consists of two or three sets. It’s not lying about hacking his security system if you do it _after_ he accused you of the act.

Crabdad predictably screes at you when you make your way into the nutrition block, but you’ve spent enough time around KK’s lusus that he’s not particularly terrifying.  He doesn’t seem to be sick or losing mass, so he’s doing alright at the hunter-gatherer thing without KK to supply food for him. He’s still happy anyway when you fish out a handful of frozen roe cubes from the freezer and deposit them on the table for him to have at; there’s no way you’re telling KK you’ve neglected his lusus in any way, shape, or form.

Sleeping in someone else’s recuperacoon has always felt like wearing someone else’s pants. KK’s is set cooler than you like and you have to stir it a bit before getting in because the slime separated a little without regular use, but as soon as you’re neck-deep in sopor, you’re done. You barely manage to get out a message of _back 2afe_ to Aradia before dropping your phone and  leaning back against the wall of the cupe until your mouth barely clears the surface. The hive could blow up and not wake you.

A solid twelve hours later, you wake up weak from starvation. This is nothing new, so you take the time to rinse off despite your stomach gnawing at your ribs. Karkat cleared out all the perishables before he left, but there’s still a box of cereal in his food stall, probably left there for this very eventuality because he is a soft-hearted fool. As if to say, ‘Fuck you with your own middle fingers, Captor, the only thing soft around here is your sorry excuse for a bonebulge,’ it is made of compressed wheat flakes, which are your least favourite.

You kind of miss him, a little.

Aradia messaged you back while you were asleep with one of her creepy smilies; par for the course. What you hadn’t expected were the messages from Tavros, who messages you approximately as often as the ocean turn to fire and the moons fall from the sky.

\-- adiosToreador [AT] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --   
AT: uH, sOLLUX, aRE YOU THERE,,,   
TA is an idle troll!   
AT: oKAY, i’LL TRY LATER, i GUESS,   
TA: not that iit’2 not a joy two 2peak two you etc etc but why   
AT: hELLO TO YOU TOO,   
AT: i HAVE, a PROBLEM, i THINK?   
TA: oh god   
AT: iT MIGHT BE A GOOD PROBLEM, oR AT LEAST A PROBLEM THAT HAS GOOD SIDES AS WELL AS BAD SIDES, uNLIKE GETTING CRIPPLED,   
AT: eXCEPT I DID GET SWEET MECHANICAL LEGS, bUT THAT’S MORE, aN UNEXPECTED BONUS,,,   
AT: aNYWAY,   
TA: dude do not ju2t comma at me, what the fuck happened?   
TA: waiit no fiir2t why are you talkiing two me iin2tead of aa or gamzee?   
AT: i TRIED TO TALK TO GAMZEE, bUT ALL HE WOULD SAY, wAS THINGS ABOUT MIRACLES BEING BITCHTITS, aND WHILE VERY AFFIRMING, tHAT IS NOT VERY USEFUL FEEDBACK, eSPECIALLY FOR SOMEONE WHO IS PANICKING A LOT, aND WOULD LIKE ANSWERS,   
AT: aND I DIDN’T TALK TO ARADIA BECAUSE, sHE IS A GOOD FRIEND, bUT I HEARD THAT SHE RENEWED HER PITCH INTEREST IN VRISKA, aND I DON’T REALLY WANT THIS GETTING BACK TO VRISKA, nOT THAT I DON’T TRUST ARADIA, bUT IF SHE GOT REALLY MAD, iT MIGHT SLIP OUT,   
AT: aND I WOULD BE REALLY GRATEFUL IF YOU WOULD KEEP THIS TO YOURSELF, eSPECIALLY SINCE IT MIGHT BE A CULLING OFFENSE,   
AT: nOT THAT I KNOW WHY, bUT  STILL,,,   
TA: fuck.   
TA: 2piit iit out then.   
AT: iT MIGHT BE EASIER, iF I SHOWED YOU,   
AT has sent file ‘tHEYGREW.jpg’   
TA: uh   
TA: tv   
TA: are tho2e wiing2?


	15. Chapter 15

It takes four laps of the room until you can stop digging your fingernails into your palms, the sting helping you stay calm. You- fine, sometimes you’re _obtuse_ , but that’s how you work. You categorise things and link between them, treating your brain and your memories as a database, and occasionally things fall through because of missing data.

This data isn’t missing. You _distinctly remember_ Eridan telling Karkat - telling all of you - about the Summoner’s revolution. The _Summoner_ , fuck. Karkat’s not the only one with a history to live up to, it seems; except Tav made the choice long ago to run screaming from this shit and never return. You don’t blame him. You _really, really_ don’t blame him.

AT: sOLLUX?   
TA: yeah ii’m fiine, ii’m totally fiine.   
TA: are you fiine? becau2e ii’m fine.   
AT: aCTUALLY, i AM KIND OF FREAKING OUT, a LOT, aND YOU ARE NOT HELPING, bY ALSO FREAKING OUT, wHICH I THINK YOU ARE.   
TA: yeah ii’m good at that. the not helpiing ii mean, ii 2uck at fliippiing out.   
TA: wtf tav.   
AT: aS I INDICATED, wITH THE FILENAME, tHEY, uH, gREW?   
AT: wHEN I MOULTED, iT’S NOT LIKE I WOKE UP, aND HAD WINGS,   
AT: aCTUALLY THAT IS EXACTLY WHAT IT WAS LIKE,    
AT: nEVER MIND,,,,   
TA: oh 2hiit you moulted and ii diidn’t even fuckiing notiice.   
TA: what’d you do about your leg2?   
AT: i DETACHED THEM,    
AT: bUT I HAVE TO GO SEE EQUIUS, aND I DON’T KNOW HOW HE’LL REACT, tO THE WHOLE WING SITUATION,   
AT: i DON’T KNOW HOW I AM REACTING, tO THE WHOLE WING SITUATION,   
AT: i THINK, i WOULD LIKE TO BE PRETENDING, tHAT IT IS NOT HAPPENING, eVEN IF WINGS ARE KIND OF AWESOME, bECAUSE I REALLY, uH, rEALLY, wOULD NOT LIKE TO BE CULLED FOR THEM, eVEN IF I AM LIKELY TO BE CULLED FOR OTHER REASONS,    
TA: tv, 2hut the fuck up, you’re not gettiing culled.   
TA: can you actually fly or are tho2e ju2t for 2how?   
AT: tHEY LOOK PRETTY BADASS, bUT I CAN ALSO FLY WITH THEM   
TA: awe2ome. get your a22 over two eq’2, ii’ll tell hiim about iit for you 2o he’2 not 2urprii2ed.   
TA: vk’2 out of town 2o you don’t have two worry about her 2howiing up.   
AT: uH,,,,,   
AT: i AM PRETTY SURE, tHAT EQUIUS MIGHT PUNCH ME, a LOT,   
AT: pOSSIBLY TO DEATH,   
TA: he won’t. he want2 my help wiith a thiing and ii can make 2ure he know2 he owe2 me iif ii need two.   
TA: and do you really have another choiice?   
AT: i GUESS NOT,   
AT: tHANK YOU, fOR STICKING YOUR NECK OUT FOR ME, aND ALSO FOR NOT CULLING ME, tHAT IS SOMETHING, tHAT I APPRECIATE,   
TA: u2 mutated freak2 have two 2tiick twogether.   
TA: get flapping, tv. ii’ll talk two eq, maybe meet you there later.   
AT: tHAT WOULD BE GOOD,   
AT: tHANKS, sOLLUX,   
\-- adiosToreador [AT] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --

You pull up Equius’s window before you can think about the fact that you _are_ sticking your neck out for Tavros in a very real way here. You’ve never even _heard_ of wings on a troll before, barring Tavros’ apparent Ancestor. KK’s blood and your bifurcation are strange enough; something more extensive makes you wonder if there was something wrong with the slurry that spawned the lot of you.

Oh well. It’s a bit late to fix now.

\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has started trolling centaursTesticle [CT] --   
TA: hey eq.   
D--> Sollux   
D--> Aradia informed me of your absence   
TA: yeah ii’m home now. and 2orry, but ii kiind of need a favour.   
D--> That is   
D--> Unexpected   
D--> How may I be of service   
TA: 2iide-eyeiing you 2o hard riight now.   
TA: iit’2 two do wiith tv.   
D--> Tavros and I have already discussed the need for replacement prosthetics post-moult   
D--> It w001d be uncouth of me to not follow through with his treatment   
TA: oh.   
TA: ii mean yeah of cour2e but that wa2n’t what ii wa2 goiing two a2k.   
TA: how do you feel about mutant2?   
D-->   
D--> I   
TA: 2hiit.    
TA: iin general. how do you feel about mutant2 IIN GENERAL.   
D--> May I assume that something has occurred during Tavros’ moult   
TA: fuck my liife   
D--> So long as it does not effect his ability to contribute to trollkind, I shall... over100k things   
D--> Is it   
D--> Major   
TA: pretty fuckiing major.   
TA: but not in2ta-cullworthy. he’2 2tiill viiable and iit’2 not a drawback.   
TA: look ii know you have i22ue2 wiith makiing 2ure trollkiind ii2 pure but iif you really thiink tv’2 gene2 are goiing two be a threat ii need two know now.   
D--> You c001d   
TA: NOPE. we are nopiing riight the fuck out of creepy command2 town riight back onto make your own fuckiing miind up zahhak hiighway.   
TA: iif ii’m already re2pon2iible for hiim ii’m not goiing two be re2pon2iible for you two becau2e we both know that end2 up wiith everybody murdered.   
D--> Ah   
D--> I take it you will be coming with Tavros   
TA: unle22 that’2 a problem.

You hold your breath. You don’t _think_ Equius will refuse, despite your vagueness about the details of Tavros’ mutation. Hopefully curiosity and how embarrassing it’d be to badmouth mutations in front of an actual mutant will win out over the need to be a bigoted bag of bulges.

D-- > As I said   
D--> I will over100k things this once   
TA: awe2ome   
TA: 2ee you 2oon   
\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has ceased trolling centaursTesticle [CT] --

\--

Tavros looks ungainly as fuck without his robolegs, but you doubt anyone who saw him was looking at his _legs_. His wings are like moth wings scaled up for a troll, massive and intimidating, and you’re suddenly very glad that Equius’ hive is built to highblood scale. As soon as he gets close enough that the wind from his wings is making your horns ache, you grab him with psionics and bring him down to eye level.

“Thanks, Sollux,” he says, with a relieved smile. “I, uh, hadn’t really thought about how I’d land.”

You resist the urge to facepalm - barely - and hook Tavros’ arm over your shoulders instead; you’ve noticed that it makes people less nervous if you give them something to lean on and don’t just float them through the air, and he needs every calming trick in the book if you’re going to tell him about the Summoner thing. You can’t really wrap an arm around his shoulders in return, but it seems to work anyway, and you float him down to the lab as carefully as you can.

Equius looks up, sees Tavros, and something goes _crunch_. You hope it wasn’t something important.

“Sollux, maybe we should, uh-” Tavros’ eyes are wide and glassy with fear, and he has to stop to breathe. You squeeze his arm and stay exactly where you are. “ _Sollux-_ ”

“It’s cool,” you say, and stare impassively at Equius. He’s gone pale, an ashy sort of white that makes the bags under his eyes shockingly blue. “Right, EQ?”

 “I,” he croaks out, and then stops, apparently for lack of words. You wait, because it’s not your job to make him a decent person, and also because keeping Tavros from hitting you in the face with a wing and flying off is apparently a full-time job. Finally, just when the silence is getting _truly_ awkward, he manages to eke out, “Yes,” and go even paler with shock at his own daring.

“Great,” you say, more cheerfully than you have ever actually felt, and pull Tavros through to a place he can sit down, at least. He clings to the edge of the table that you deposit him on and stares at you desperately until you position yourself between him and Equius.

“I have to, to-” Equius says, before giving up on his pretense of composure entirely and fleeing the room.

You wait for a moment to see whether his internal Propriety-o-Meter settles on ‘cull the mutant’ or ‘have a breakdown’ and assume the latter when he doesn’t come back in and try to punch Tavros to death, then sit down next to Tavros and let yourself relax. “That went well.”

Tavros gives you the most skeptical look you’ve ever seen in your life before burying his head in his hands.

\--

Equius is more composed when he comes back in; he only flinches when he looks at Tavros once, then visibly steels himself and nods, retreating into the arms of courtesy. Tavros utterly fails to relax, but you do, at least. You’re pretty sure that Equius’ highblood honor schtick won’t let him break his word.

“The legs only require fitting,” Equius says, his voice muted, running on autopilot as he pulls Tavros’ new legs from under a dust cloth. They’re beefier than AA’s, shaped to fit with Tavros’ profile, and you have to wonder how Equius _knew_ what size to make them. He’s a lot more intelligent than you give him credit for, sometimes. You’ve been thinking of him as the hardware guy while you’re the software guy, but that’s not exactly _correct_ ; you have to remember that he builds robots - start to finish, doing _everything_ \- by himself. He’s not like you, manic and glorious and obsessive, but he’s practiced enough that what he does is intuitive, like you even if he didn’t get there the same way.

The process of fitting Tavros’ legs goes quickly, even the painful parts where he nearly squeezes your hand off your wrist, and suddenly he’s standing up and tottering around the lab and getting the same How To Care For Your Brand New Appendages speech that Aradia got.  He’s a lot calmer, now that he can stand up under his own power again. Your fingers are glad for that.

“Are you, uh, going to tell anyone?” Tavros asks Equius, once his legs are fully calibrated, and you have to resist the urge to beat your head against the wall and not stop until you’re a mustard splatter that doesn’t have to deal with interpersonal conflicts ever again.

Equius continues calmly putting his tools away, showing admirable amounts of restraint and patience. “I will not,” he says, and it is final. “I would suggest that you devise a way to hide-” he gestures helplessly, his limit apparently reached at having to _say_ what a filthy mutant Tavros is. “It will quickly become obvious despite me, I imagine.”

Tavros’ grin freezes on his face. You kind of want to laugh, in that hollow and hopeless way, but it’s probably the first chance he’s had to stop panicking about the situation and think about it. And now you’re going to drop the Ancestor bomb on him. Maybe he’ll get home before he has a panic-based pusher attack, if you’re lucky.

“I’ll walk you out,” you say, to defuse the situation and get things rolling again. Tavros follows you up the stairs after a few moments of awkward tableau, and you try to put together how you’ll spring ‘so your Ancestor was a revolution fairy’ on him. He had that thing for fairies, right?

You wish AA was here instead. She’s the one of you that’s good with people and you’re the one of you that’s good with computers and everyone seems to be getting them confused lately. Including you, which is not a comfortable thought. You prefer playing to your strengths instead of trying to develop skills you’ll never have.

“Thanks for doing this, Sollux,” Tavros says, running his hands through his mohawk nervously. “At least it’s one less black mark on the cull list, right?”

“What?” you say, then, when your brain catches up with the conversation, “TV, shut up, you’re not getting culled. FF’s going for Empress.”

His eyes widen in surprise and he stumbles on a stair, only saved from becoming a cautionary tale by the fact that you can catch things with your brain. “Thanks. Uh, that’s great and all, but is she really likely to...?” He cringes a little as he trails off, making his meaning clear.

You haven’t thought of it. More specifically, you won’t think of it. FF’s ability to shove a fork through her Ancestor’s torso is - well, it _is_ something you have to be concerned about, but at the same time, it’s not your concern. She’s training. It’ll have to be enough.

“We’re making it likely,” you say, and your voice sounds cold and alien even to your ears. You try to shake it off as you say, “Look, there’s something that you should know,” and try to not feel guilty over the way his shoulders suddenly sag. You’ve been there - _what else is the world going to fucking throw at me tonight_ \- before. “I know who your Ancestor was.”

“And?” Tavros says, with all the skepticism that comment deserves.

“His title was the Summoner.” You wave a hand at your head, to make it clear how that links to him. “Big guy. Cavalreaper. Had wings.”

Tavros’ jaw drops, and you can see the sudden flare of hope, of _well, if someone else had wings_...

“He was a revolutionary,” you say, stomping on those hopes before they can go any further. If Tavros survives, it will be on his own merit. “His revolution was what got all the adults exiled off-planet- it’s not just that Alternia is the heart of the Empire and so grubs are hatched here, it’s _exile_.”

“What do you want?” Tavros asks, cutting through all your bullshit. There’s a certain set to his shoulders that makes you feel guilty and stop in your tracks, because you’ve been learning your entire life that not everybody is as enthusiastic as you and you need to tone it the fuck down around normal people, and apparently the lesson hasn’t sunk in yet.

“Do whatever you want,” you say, spreading your hands in an I-couldn’t-care-less gesture. “You have options, is what I’m saying. KK’s ancestor was a revolutionary too, he’s off spreading the word about FF and trying to get support. We’re _serious_ about doing this, TV. You could help.”

Tavros hesitates and you actually dare to have hope for a second, before he shakes his head and it all comes crashing down. “I, uh, really don’t think I’m the person you’re looking for, Sollux. I’m sorry.” Left unsaid is the context of _I tried once and highbloods ruined me_ , and in all honesty you really don’t blame him for not trying again.

“It’s cool,” you say, and shrug. “Thought you should know, anyway.”

“Thanks,” he says, and scuffs a foot against the ground awkwardly. “Say hi to Aradia?”

“Yeah,” you say, and back off a couple steps. “Fly safe.”

You probably could have talked him into it. Played up the heroism and the Ancestor angle, or even gotten Aradia to sweet-talk him. When they were still Team Charge he would have done a lot for her; you’re not sure if it still holds true, but it would have been worth a shot. But you didn’t, and you won’t, because being jerked around sucks intensely and AA would probably yell at you for it. It’s not like you don’t know where to reach him if you need a last-minute revolutionary boost.

\--

Equius is doing his robo-deathmatch thing when you make it back down the stairs, but you’re too done with being an asshole today to bother teasing him for it this time. Instead, you start looking through all the cupboards until you find one full of rolled-up paper. The one on top is the helmsystem that you scribbled all over, and you unroll it over the nearest desk before finding a red marker and sitting down to decipher the notes you made while fucked up on sleep deprivation and worry.

You have absolutely no idea what you were trying to do with this blueprint.

Well, that’s a lie; you can see where you were _going_ , it just happened to be in the wrongest direction possible. You started scribbling all over these schematics when you thought they were still traditional Helmsman gear, not whatever Equius managed to slap together in an effort to make a detachable rig, and it shows. You need a fresh copy if you’re going to make any headway, but somehow you doubt Equius feels like showing you where to find one at right this very moment, so you do what you can to the soundtrack of crunching, folding metal.

You’ve just figured out the first cluster of extrasensory nodes – in the _fingers_ , you’re not much given to being disturbed by body modding given your entire life, but that makes you shudder a little – when there’s an especially loud clang and then everything goes silent. You look up as casually as you can, like it’s no big deal that Equius just demolished an entire fucking robot in a fit of rage. You’re not even as terrified as you should be. Instead, you want to roll your eyes and say, ‘really?’ except that even you realise that it’d be a bad move for your future survival.

You opt for the path that means AA won’t throw a palmtop at you out of despair and say, too loud since it has to carry through the room, “EQ, come help me with this.”

Equius turns from the wreckage at his feet, his total lack of reaction when he finally sees you making your skin itch. He’s always been stoic, sure, but it’s not exactly hard to get a read off the guy – he’s usually at least one of offended, dignified, or angry; you expected all three as a reaction to you bringing Tavros in and the fact that you’re getting none of them is worrying.

“Leave,” he says, and then blanks you out entirely by stooping to pick up assorted pieces of chassis.

“What?” you say, your stomach somewhere in the region of your knees. You’re a fuckup when it comes to social interactions, it can’t be denied, but you didn’t think that you’d get kicked out of the lab and a forced project abandonment , and with KK and FF sticking their necks out you _need_ to work on the rig and give them something tangible to use in their campaigns. “EQ, wait-”

“I will not,” he says, icy, and you pause halfway through getting out of your chair. “It is clear that you have as much regard for me as you would for any other tool you use, and I have no desire to continue being treated as such.” The robot arm in his hand crumples, and you can’t help flinching. “No harm will come to Tavros or Aradia. _Leave_.”

You assess your options, mentally say your goodbyes to AA, and settle back into the chair, crossing one leg over the other and resting your arms on the armrests. “Make me.”

Equius grits his teeth – you hear something crunch, _ow_ – and drops the robot parts he’s collected. “You are provoking me-”

You drum your fingers on the armrests of your chair. “Yeah, the thing is, we don’t have time for tantrums. If you’re going to pull the whole we-aren’t-friends-now thing, you should probably find someone who hasn’t been friends with KK since fucking ever, because I have seen some angry snits and yours don’t measure up. What’s your damage, Zahhak?”

“We are not _friends_ ,” Equius hisses, and you are honestly surprised you don’t shit yourself in terror. He steps towards you before stopping himself and gripping the corner of the desk instead; his fingers sink into the solid metal and your mouth goes dry. “Friends do not – _push_ , you have taken my limits and flagrantly danced around them, I have been _generous-_ ”

You take off your glasses, willing your hands steady, and polish them clean with the hem of your shirt. “I should be grateful, is what you’re saying,” you clarify, and your voice barely even shakes. “Poor little lowblood me, given access to all this tech through your noble highblood _graciousness_.” You can feel little bits of psi flickering in and out of existence, making your horns ache, and try to clamp down on it.

“No,” Equius says, and sags. His grip loosens on the desk, but the tension in the air stays; you feel more tightly-wound and venomous with every breath, just waiting for him to fuck up. “You have treated me as a _tool_ and made me turn on my own principles out of some- some desire to turn me to your cause piece by piece and I cannot tolerate your usage of me.” His back is ramrod straight and chin high, despite the faint sheen of sweat on his skin. “Leave.”

You kick back in your chair. “So this _is_ about Tavros.” You lift an eyebrow, fighting to keep disdain out of your tone. “You’re the one who agreed to fixing him up. It’s not like I twisted your arm.”

Equius slams a hand down on the desk, tearing a hole in it, and you can’t help your jump. “You hid the details of his mutation and implied that it was unnoticeable! Now I - personally - am _responsible_ if the next generation of trolls has wings! _Wings_!”

“So are you going to cull me?” you ask, seizing the opportunity. “If you don’t, trollkind might have doubled horns next generation.”

“I-” he says.

You lean forward a little and stage-whisper, spiteful to the last, “Or double _bulges_.”

You can almost see Equius’ eyes behind the dark lenses he wears, a shadow of movement as they widen and he stumbles back. “I-” he tries again, then swallows and says, “No.”

“What?” you ask, your pulse drumming in your ears. “No _what_? You’re _not_ going to cull me?” You throw your arms out and tilt your head back. “Filthy fucking mutant messing up trollkind _right here_ , Zahhak!”

“I could say that you are valuable to the Empire,” he bites out, maintaining his distance, “or that you are protected and valued by those greater than me.” His mouth goes flat, tightly controlled, before he continues. “I appreciated having a partner in my work that found it as interesting as I do.”

The fact that he doesn’t rise to your bait trips you up, and you let your arms sink to your sides as you deflate. “I _do_ -”

“-You treat me as a tool!” Equius snaps, and you flinch, finally hearing him. “You did not think I would help Tavros, or Vantas - _yes_ , I am aware of Vantas’s _unsuitability_ \- and so you lied to me and used me and ignored my own sensibilities and all the bending of my principles that I have performed for you thus far! I am well aware that you think yourself clever-” here, his voice drips with the venom you were spitting earlier, and you flinch again “-but you have thought yourself past valuing anyone who does not support your ideology wholeheartedly, it seems, and I will not be used as a piece in your game.”

You swallow, before croaking out, “That’s unfair.”

“You’re merely treating me as members of your caste have been treated by mine?” Equius asks, and now he’s resorting to the weary, put-upon blueblood schtick that gets up your nose and makes you want to flip a table, because he doesn’t even _see_ that being able to condescend to you like this is something that sets him apart from you. “I have - at great personal cost - rehabilitated Tavros and Aradia without protest, and I have done my best to work with you and repay the trust you have shown me by informing me of the Heiress’ plan. You have lied to me, found my limits, and _danced_ on them, Captor. As you continue to do so now, I might add.”

You fold your arms across your chest and hunch in on yourself. At this point, you’re not sure why you’re still arguing - if he’s going to see it that way, there’s not much you can do to disabuse him of the notion.

There’s just - there’s a part of him that has potential, and that grates at you. The part of him that offered you a chance in a blueprint and told you that you were more than a battery and that the Empire should treat you justly, the part of him that spent countless hours keeping AA running when she should have died because of you when you were six. Somehow that part manages to exist along with the ideology that you all belong to the Empire as more than subjects - as entities to be used, batteries and cannon fodder and all the shit grunt jobs that nobody up the ladder wants to dirty their hands with - and at the same time, that the Empire is a meritocracy, that if you were good enough and just tried hard enough, you could escape all that without repercussion.

You can’t say the words. There’s a lump of helpless rage and sadness in your throat that stops you, because you don’t think you can crush something this naive and optimistic. Instead, though it’s the last thing you mean, you manage to force a, “Sorry,” past your lips.

Equius sighs and picks up the robot parts he dropped, collecting them on the part of the desk that he didn’t destroy with his bare hands. “You are not Vriska,” he says, and you’re lost by the apparent change of subject. “I have known her a long time,” he says, as he begins cracking open bits of robot that can be salvaged. “She has certain patterns to her behaviour, where she will perform an action, apologise, and then perform actions in the same vein nonetheless. Do not apologise to me unless you mean the apology.”

You flush in shame, reflexively. This isn’t unsimilar to AA giving you a few choice words about how much of an asshole you are whenever someone you don’t know very well manages to catch the sharp side of your tongue - which is more often than you like to admit, because your sense of humour is caustic and sometimes cruel, and you’re lucky that KK and AA know you well enough to get it. Equius shouldn’t know you well enough to be able to give you a dressing-down, but the fact that he does means that he’s been watching you a hell of a lot more than you’ve been watching him.

For all his anger - and he’s still angry, you can tell now that you’re looking, past your own overblown hissy fit - he hasn’t threatened you, or laid a hand on you. He managed to stay at a decent distance and control his reactions, and from a guy who punches robots to cyberdeath, that means a lot. Even now, he’s cleaning up, not forcing you out even though he wants you gone.

You have one last shot at this, you’re guessing, before you have to flee.

“I’m not good at people,” you offer, and are rewarded by him stilling for a moment before continuing to pull apart the remains of an arm. “I- AA’s the one who’s good at people and I’m the nerd who sits in his room all night- but that’s not an excuse.” You stop and gather your thoughts before you can botch things up worse than you have. “I mean, I don’t- I’m paranoid and I don’t know where to stop, with people, because with a program you keep going until it does what you want or just scrap your effort entirely.”

“You are saying you were not aware of how you were pushing me,” Equius states, flatly.

You wince, because the truth is going to make you look even worse - but only the truth has ever worked with AA, and she’s kind of the only experience you’ve got with making apologies. “I knew, but- it doesn’t occur to me, sometimes, that people aren’t a series of behaviours to exploit. Usually AA snaps me out of it, but. She’s doing her own thing.”

You can’t tell what Equius is thinking, but you’re taking it as a good sign that he hasn’t wrecked your shit completely. Finally, reluctantly, he says, “I do not think it would be possible for us to work together if you require constant reminders to not test my temper.”

“I’ll remember,” you say, and it sounds lame even to your ears. “Yeah, I’m working with you because you’re useful,” you say, gloomily committed to the truth even if it’s likely to get your face caved in. “Let’s be honest, there isn’t anybody on- or off-planet who can do what we do. You already know that I’m doing this to help overthrow the Condesce, so.”

The last of the tension in the air dissipates when he sighs. “I understand the frustration of the conflict between our views,” he says, and you bristle because he sure as fuck doesn’t understand it from the trodden-on side, but before you can say anything, he continues, “I even- to a point, I agree with you. If that is enough, and you can see it as enough, I would still carry out the Helming project with you. It is not something that I can complete on my own.”

“I’m not going to let you walk all over me,” you say, testing.

He mops his forehead with his arm. “Nor I, you.”

You breathe and let your thoughts slow down from racing and reactionary to something more reasonable. This is the best compromise you could hope for, you think, and at least you’re both on more open ground now - less solid footing, perhaps, but at least you can see where the limits are now.

You still get the feeling that you should run screaming from being caught up in highblood shit - but at least you’re almost on even footing with Equius, catching him up in your own games, and he can’t say he didn’t know if it all comes crashing down around his ears, which it’s likely to do.

“You knew about KK?” you ask.

He huffs. “Simple logic and observation.”

Your skin prickles at the thought of Equius knowing about Karkat - having known about Karkat for a long time, even, because as much as KK tried to hide his blood it was always obvious he was hiding _something_ \- and you scratch your shoulder absently. “And you didn’t report him because?”

He looks away, reluctantly aware of his hypocrisy as he colours faintly. “Nepeta is fond of him.”

You sigh and let yourself sink down in the chair, too worn out by all these emotions to bother keeping up the facade of being normal. “Fuck, EQ.” Before he can frown at you for language, you add, “If you’re gonna ask me to not jump around on your sore spots, I get to ask you to ditch the ‘not-highbloods are bad because they’re not highbloods’ circular logic bullshit.”

“That seems fair,” he allows, like he wasn’t just destroying a robot in a fit of rage and kicking you out for good over daring to push him on the concept. “I cannot promise immediate and total compliance,” he says, and you shrug in response. “Is that enough?”

“It’ll do,” you say, and swivel your chair back around to face the desk. “You got another copy of this? I should get started.”


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I accidentally updated early over on Tumblr, so the AO3 crowd should probably get a chance to read it early too!
> 
> **HUGE warnings for dubcon in this chapter, of the mating cycle variety.** Be warned.

You ransack your library of Helmsman knowledge to gather a variety of horrifically out of date blueprints and spread them over every flat surface in Equius’ lab. You’re still twitchy from your fight and he’s even more silent than usual as you print things out, but twenty minutes into your scribbling he makes a suggestion and you relax a little.

Between the examples of what exists and Equius’ overly-optimistic look at what could be, you manage to draft the main nerve redirection implant points before you surface from your single-minded focus at the sound of your palmtop going off.

\-- apocalypseArisen [AA] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --  
AA: tavros is worried about you!  
TA: awe2ome.  
TA: why?  
AA: because apparently you were inciting equius to murder and youve been idle for a while  
AA: are you murdered  
AA: say yes so i can throw a corpse party  
TA: 2orry aa. iif ii wa2 goiing two get murdered for 2omeone 2o they could throw a party, you know iit would be you.  
TA: thank2 for 2oundiing worriied by the way, that mean2 a lot to me.  
AA: if equius laid a hand on you i would be very surprised  
TA: ehehe yeah. alway2 bet on the 2crawny kiid wiith braiin power2.  
AA: anyway as long as youre safe i have to go kick some ass  
AA: eridan told me you built this fort!  
AA: its very pretty  
TA: ehehe he ha2 you on fort duty two, niice.  
TA: 2tay 2afe, aa.  
AA: when have i ever done anything dangerous  
\-- apocalypseArisen [AA] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --

You have to smile at that, a little. She must have been more worried than her words let on; the last time you tried to talk to her while she was FLARPing, sweeps ago, she almost managed to blow your palmtop up in your face by rerouting one of your own viruses. As it was, your firewall caught it and your respiteblock smelled of molten wax for the next week, and neither of you ever actually apologised.

“Have you completed your task?” Equius asks, from across the room. You gave him a copy of your draft and a marker and sent him off to double-check your work, although he barely knows what to look for when it comes to organic systems. He’s picked up just enough to follow along, through working with Aradia and your second-hand knowledge, but you’re probably going to have to give him a crash course sooner rather than later.

“What task?” you ask, blinking down at the secondary neurointeraction system you’re trying to lay out. You only started it an hour ago, and even you aren’t _that_ good. “Why, are you done?”

A distinctly confused silence fills the air for a smidge longer than is comfortable, and then Equius says, “For Vriska.”

Your good mood crashes all at once and you turn back to the paper before you, scowling. “Not yet. It’s an on and off thing.” You scratch at your collarbone in irritation before adding, “I’ll be around for a while.”

“Ah,” Equius says, and then you’re lost in a gaping silence again, punctuated by the rustling of paper and the squeak of markers.

\--

The next two days feel like some perverse mimicry of adult life; you wake up in the evening, fly over to Equius’ hive via KK’s, work until you have to leave or get roasted flying home, then do it again. It makes you kind of wish you weren’t a psionic – you could grow to enjoy working on puzzles for the Empire, and that scares you. Because, sure, you have some faith in Feferi to not mess things up - but if Feferi fails and you’re not summarily executed, and the Empire grows a clue in its massive bureaucratic thinkpan, and you’re set to work for them instead of being Helmed, you don’t even want to think about the horrors you’d happily come up with.

Still, as you ease back into Equius’ good graces, and he into yours, you are forced to admit that you could get used to this. It’s kind of nice, working in the same room as someone else; you’re still hunched over a desk, most of the time, but watching Equius build things is something that you don’t think will ever get old.

You weren’t expecting to be watched back. Which, okay, is fair game since you treat him as an entertainment device, but when you look away, digging your fingers into the back of your neck to sooth the itch of awkwardness that stings you for getting caught looking, he says, “You’re scratching.”

You freeze. Equius looks back down to his work and adjusts a clamp that you’re pretty sure doesn’t need adjusting while he waits for you to put two and two together and admit what’s happening to yourself.

Your body has betrayed you, and you’re not giving it the reward of having a perfectly functional skeleton for it; you fold over until your forehead is pressed against the metal table - and it feels cool enough that you want to slap yourself for not realising you were feverish-hot as your body started burning the admittedly small stockpile of resources it has. You should have upped your caloric intake, or at least stopped flying everywhere so much, but it’s probably too late now.

You’re moulting.

“Whatever,” you say, wanting the assurance yourself more than to assure Equius. “I’m not crawling for a cupe yet.” You smooth out the blueprint and stare at it, the rough form of an adult body created in wires and sensors. You’ll be one step closer to being that, soon, whether you like it or not.

“You need to rest,” Equius says, still not looking up. “I can carry on the work for a week.”

You want to let him. It’s true that he’ll have his hands full with testing what you’ve already drafted, as much as he can test things without a subject to test them on. He’ll still be able to verify the physicalities of the design - that the connections work as intended, that a signal is routed properly, that the materials can hold up to the stresses of the job – but you always intended to move along to another part while he did the testing, because Ascension is coming and it doesn’t care that you’re all moulting, or that drones will start appearing soon. “I can’t,” you finally say, reluctant.  “There’s no time.”

Equius takes a deep breath. “I would be grateful,” he says, haltingly, “if you were to rest.”

You scowl and pick up your marker, more to make a point than because you feel capable of using it. Now that you’re aware of – well, it’s not a fever, exactly, you’re just running hot, but now that you’re aware of it you can feel it pressing in on your ability to think, devouring your attention piece by piece and leaving a hollow, throbbing headache in its wake. You’ve worked through worse, but that doesn’t mean you like it. “There’s _no time_ ,” you repeat, cementing the idea in your head. “If I’m moulting, then NP’s next, and it’s going to be up in the midbloods – our deadline is _Ascension,_ EQ. It’s too fucking close. I can still work.”

Equius sighs, his hands loose on the clamp he was adjusting. “Will you be able to fly home if you wait?” he asks, his voice surprisingly gentle. “Your handwriting has been getting worse. I would be astonished if you were able to walk a straight line.”

You groan. Then you pick up your palmtop.

\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has started trolling apocalypseArisen [AA] --  
TA: liife 2uck2.  
TA: piick me up from eq’2 when you’re done flarpiing.  
AA: im with feferi tonight  
AA: i was wondering when youd moult  
AA: its going to be a few hours but i can leave now if you need me  
TA: no, iit’2 fiine.  
TA: well no iit 2uck2 liike a piinhole iin a hull but when doe2 anythiing not.  
TA: take your tiime.  
AA: you take care  
AA: dont push yourself  
AA: if you need a nap then take one  
AA: ill be there as soon as this thing ends <>  
TA: go end iit then  
TA: <>  
\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has ceased trolling apocalypseArisen [AA] --

“AA will swing by and pick me up in a while,” you say, dropping your palmtop on the table. “That good enough?”

Equius inclines his head and goes back to his work for real, instead of fiddling with things awkwardly while working up the courage to point out that you’re being an idiot. You try to follow his example, but the surface of the table is cool, even through the blueprints, and your brain is lulling you into a false sense of security.

You don’t know when you fall asleep.

\--

The next thing you know, there’s a warm hand on your shoulder. You feel like you’re falling for one unpleasant moment and jerk upright, your hands splayed and crackling with power, until the confusion falls away and you realise that you’re just in Equius’s  lab, with Aradia’s hand on your shoulder and a dense ache everywhere else.

The corners of her mouth lift up a little. “How are you feeling?”

“Fucking fantastic,” you say, your tongue leaden in your mouth and messing up your sibilants even worse than normal. The spot between your shoulders that you know you can’t reach itches more than it did before you slept, and you gloomily take it as a sign of things to come. “I want my cupe.”

“Well, at least you’re being sensible, for once.” Aradia takes your hand and rubs her thumb over your knuckles.  Her hand is bigger than yours, fingers curling around your palm; soon your proportions will be better, you hope. “Ready to leave?”

You look past her, to Equius, who somehow managed to get the blueprints you were working on out from under you and now has them on his desk. He looks somewhat awkward and sheepish, and you recognise the look as your I-don’t-know-what-to-do-in-this-social-situation look. “Keep building the- the thing,” you say to him, all faculty of thought escaping you. You just want to nuzzle into Aradia’s neck and sleep. “You should have it done by the time I’m done.”

Equius turns faintly blue, and you realise the double entendre just in time to snort at yourself. He recovers with only a single scandalised look – you’re pretty sure Aradia is smirking – and says, “Enjoy your respite,” drily.

You think he might be developing a sense of humour.

It’s weird, flying under Aradia’s influence. Her psi feels strange against your skin, more forceful and less crackly than yours. You try to help a couple of times, but the first time you send the both of you ass-about and the second time you fizzle out and after that Aradia insists that she can handle towing your pathetic glutes around all night if she must and _stop helping_ , at which point you give up and lull against her side, her arm around you.

She doesn’t leave you when you’re back at your hivestem. She installs you in the ablutions stall – “Wash your hair, Sollux.” – and then turns your entire hive upside-down, unplugging all the electronics and swapping out your sopor for fresh. By the time you totter out, wrapped up in a towel, there’s nothing left to distract you from falling into your recuperacoon and never coming back out, except Aradia herself.

She looks up from her palmtop and smiles at how helpless you must look, hair slicked down and still dripping, and pats her lap. “Come here.”

You go, because you’ll never be able to refuse Aradia anything, and in this instance you don’t even want to. You’re still running too warm, but even so, her heat is comforting instead of overwhelming. She takes your hand again and you close your eyes in relief, only to open them again in a hurry when you hear the first _snick_ of something being cut.

“Don’t fuss,” she says, putting the nail clippers on your lap and pulling out a nail file. “You’ll scratch your skin off if I don’t do this.”

You whine into her neck as piteously as you can.

“And no psi,” she says, filing your shortened nail down into a smooth, utterly useless shape. “Because I love you,” she adds, in vicious triumph at winning the pity war.

You let her trim the rest of your nails without complaint, because your brain is shutting down again and this seems to be the quickest route to a cupe. You can eat and catch up on any messages when you’re more awake, and if anything desperately needs your attention, well, Aradia knows all your passwords anyway.

She pours you into the blue side of your cupe more tenderly than you expected her to, and smooths back your hair with a wistful smile. You guess she doesn’t get many opportunities to fuss over you properly. You don’t get fits of rage, and for all that you abuse your body, it doesn’t often fail you like hers has the opportunity to.

\--

You weren’t sure what to expect – well, okay, you’ve had the same schoolfeeding as everyone else, What to Expect When Your Skin Melts Off and the Drones Come Knocking, but you weren’t prepared for the immediate physicality of it. Your bones ache and feel like they want to burst through your skin. Your grublegs itch. Your shoulders itch. Your back itches so much that you think literally being set on fire would be less painful.

It’s nothing compared to the surge of _need_ that hits you as soon as you take a breath. It shuts down anything remotely resembling cognitive action, reducing you to a shambling mess of pheromones that want – anything, skin under your hands, something pressed against you from horns to toenails, something that goes in you, _through_ you. You want to consume and be consumed and satiate this need and never have it end.

Your hands find warmth, and all you can do is shiver helplessly at the jolt it sends to your bulge.

“S’lux?” Aradia asks.

You follow the curves of her with your hands, too gone to answer her. Before you can do anything else, your hands are yanked above your head, and you almost sob at the feel of unfamiliar psi on your skin.

“Sollux Captor,” Aradia says, and there is a grim note in her voice that makes enough of the need recede that you can listen, “stop and _look_ at yourself.”

You breathe in the air and exhale, unable to move between the lock on your hands and the sopor up to your hips. The whole world smells like AA-but-more, spicy and tempting, and it settles on your skin like sweat. Still, though, there is the part of you that recoils at Aradia’s anger, and it manages to send up a signal flare despite your hormones.

_This is wrong_ , it says.

You grit your teeth and force yourself to think that thought, focus on the itch that burns your entire torso instead of the one that presses at you lower down, and struggle your way back to – Aradia is your _moirail_.

“Fuck,” you gasp. “Fuck, AA, I didn’t-” You screw your eyes shut so that you don’t have to look at her – she got in _sopor_ for you and this is how you repay her, you are the _worst_.

“I should have expected it,” Aradia says, regretful, and reaches out to stroke your cheek. You can’t help but press into it, your lips parting to chirr even as you feel sick at yourself. She strokes your cheekbone anyway, until the gesture becomes familiar instead of a shock of skin-on-skin, and you take comfort from focussing on it to the exclusion of everything else. “Do you want help?” Aradia asks, candid.

It takes you a moment – you’re not exactly a specimen of intelligence with how you are right now – but then your eyes snap open at the realisation of what she’s offering. Opening your eyes was a mistake; for all that Aradia is half-metal, she’s – well, you pity her, you’ve always known she’s attractive, but with your bulge straining at your sheath and you near-dying of lust, she is resplendant, everything that you could ever want.

“No!” you shriek, as fast as you can; your brain is _lying_ to you, Aradia is your moirail and you cannot – _will_ not – let yourself take advantage of that. “No,” you say again, begging her. You don’t want her to change. You don’t want the two of you to change, you _need_ her more than you could need anything, including this, and you’ve already had your one get-out-of-fucking-everything-up-free card.

She purses her lips. “Sollux...”

“No!” you wail again, at your limit. “I love you, AA, fuck, _don’t_.”

She sighs and climbs out of your cupe. You close your eyes and swallow, not wanting to be dragged back under by your hormones, for all that she’s still holding you in place. She won’t let you go. You trust her to not let you go, for all the terror rising in you that she will.

“There’s an hour until sundown,” she says, and you have to force yourself to concentrate on her words. You think she sounds reluctant, but it’s hard to tell. “I could message Eridan.”

You stare at the backs of your eyelids, uncomprehending, until it finally sinks in and you could weep. _Eridan_. You’re allowed to touch Eridan – and he’s your _kismesis_ , this is the worst possible time for him to see you, but you need someone who isn’t AA. _Anyone_ who isn’t AA.

“Please,” you say, in a broken gasp. Everything south of your waist is pulsing with repressed desire, now, and you feel sick to your stomach at being such a slave to your body. You feel bad for wondering if KK nailed his hands to his desk now – you would, if AA would let you.

She’s silent for a long minute – you don’t dare open your eyes, and your heart thuds with the fear that she’s left, except you can still feel her in the room – you can practically _taste_ her, and it _hurts_. Finally, she says, “Do you want to wait in the ablutions chamber?”

“Yes,” you say, because putting a door between you is the best thing you can think of right now. She dumps you into the room and shuts the door before any sopor has a chance to drip off of you, and all you can do is lie against the tiles of the floor and dig your fingers into it, trying to cling onto any self-control you have left.

It lasts until you manage to crawl into the ablutions stall, hand already wedged between your thighs.

\--

You’re not sure how long it’s been when Eridan gets to your hivestem – you’re thinking a little clearer now, but you can’t make yourself go anywhere near the door or call out to AA, so you just curl up into a ball in the ablutions stall and wait instead, futilely trying to scratch around your grubleg scars. You know he’s outside before you even hear him speaking to Aradia; something in the air changes, and – you must have been able to smell all this stuff on a subconscious basis before you started moulting, because every pathetic muscle in your body tenses up, and a surge of hate slams into your ribs. You know Eridan.

You manage to push yourself up onto your feet and cross over to the door on shaking legs, itches temporarily forgotten. You can hear them murmuring outside, but not what they’re saying – and then you hear the click of a door, barely. The only other door in your shitty collection of blocks is the door to the hallway, which means that Aradia must have left.

You sag against your own door with relief. You’ve managed to hold onto the fact that Eridan will be okay for you to take this out on and that Aradia is off-limits, but you didn’t want to keep testing it. You’re still not sure that riding this out with Eridan is the best idea, but it’s better than the alternatives.

Muffled footsteps sound outside the door, getting closer. You may not have any control over your psionics and you might be as wretched as you can possibly get, but the night you can’t give Eridan Ampora a scare is the night you give up on breathing. When the footsteps pause, you slam your hand against the door, and then collapse in wheezing laughter at the tirade that results.

He slams open the door – breaking the latch, fucking highbloods – and you stumble back, still snickering. “Captor,” he says, his expression stony as he advances on you, unwinding his scarf, “you ain’t half as funny as you think you are.”

You’re at a disadvantage, since you can’t use psionics for fear of blowing him up and your limbs are approximately sturdy as cooked noodles, but you don’t care. You’re in this to blow off some steam, not to spend hours on foreplay and teasing. Since you’re also at the disadvantage clothing-wise, you do your best to rectify that, pulling off his glasses before going for his shirt.

“Sol,” Eridan says, muffled by his shirt coming off. Once you get it free of his horns, he puts his hands on your shoulders and pushes you back into the wall, knocking the wind out of you. You can’t help the gasp you make, and seeing his pupils dilate is almost as intoxicating as the heat cycle itself. “Sol,” he says again, and swallows. “’Ray told me she’d murder me if I didn’t make sure you want this.”

You reach out, clumsy, and grab his sides, your hands pressing down on his gills. His breath hitches – you watch the jump of his chest and want to bite him, mark him up and tear him down – but he keeps his hands on your shoulders, maintaining the short distance between you. You’re sick of – of this maintaining of boundaries, of having to constantly fight your body and tend to it and then get jerked around by it anyway. If you can’t maintain control - and you can already feel it slipping away, a terrifying destruction of your own will - you’re going to cede it.

“Try to fucking stop me,” you say, the last coherent sentence you think you’ll manage for a while, and pull him forward.

\--

You can think again, a little, by the time Eridan picks you up and dumps you in the cupe. Aradia is mysteriously absent - home, you hope, away from you, for all that you could use your moirail - and you’re almost kind of glad that Eridan shoved you straight in sopor, because you don’t want to think about it. Her smell still lingers around the room and you duck lower in the cupe to try to escape it.

Of course, Eridan wouldn’t be your kismesis if he let you be. He slides into the other side of your cupe before saying, uncertain, “Sol.”

You close your eyes and let your breathing slow and ignore the part of yourself that already wants you to tear yourself apart with sex and claws and anything else. Talking about things is overrated.

“Sol.” Eridan prods you in the shoulder, undeterred. “You snore like a fuckin’ chainsaw when you’re asleep, so quit frontin’.”

“What,” you finally say, too tired and wrung-out to bother with formalities like facing the person you’re talking to or inflection.

“Well,” Eridan says, then falters. You make a mental note to be surprised when you’ve recovered the ability to emote. “It’s just- this is your worst fuckin’ nightmare, ain’t it?”

“Yeah,” you say, and sink a little further down in the sopor. You don’t want to think about this and pick it apart - and more than that, you don’t want Eridan to, either. “What, you getting off on it?”

He’s quiet for a long time before he says, so low that you can barely hear him, “Not in particular.”

You can’t sleep. Normally, by now, the sopor would have pulled you under, but your bones ache and your skin itches and your nook fucking _hurts_ when you let yourself think about it, all despite the soothing of the sopor. It’s nothing compared to the pain in your head, a dried-out, focussed pain that stabs at your sinuses whenever you inhale, always just surprising enough to snap your out of a lull. There’s nothing left to distract you but this conversation, so you finally turn over and look at him, your eyes almost-closed against the light of day that’s creeping up.

You think - and you hope it’s you thinking - that Eridan looks kind of pretty in barely-there sunlight, beams from around the edges of your blackout curtains, all blurred by your lack of glasses and your thin field of vision. He keeps surprising you, in these quiet moments, when you’re wrung-out and weary down to the electrical impulses that are all you are.

“What do you mean?” you ask, and feel - fuck, you don’t have words for it, but almost like you feel when AA kisses your forehead and tells you to sleep after a three-day coding bender and you really want to make it to a fourth, fussed-over and thwarted and all tangled up in feelings, when he blinks at you in surprise.

With everything that’s happened since you first went FLARPing with Eridan, you forgot that black romance is still romance, as infinitely changeable and adaptable as your relationship with AA. Sometimes it’ll be flirting and rivalry, and sometimes, you guess, it’ll be barely-barbed words in the hours past dawn.

“You ain’t you, Captor,” Eridan says, and then laughs, a short, bitter sound. “If you really want to know, you were fuckin’ terrifyin’. You didn’t care who I was.”

Eridan – Eridan expects you to snark about Feferi and how he’s never cared for what his partner wants, but you’re sick of that argument, and, as he says, his problem has never been _not_ caring. It’s been not listening and being completely fucking obtuse, and right now you can almost sympathise with him, except for the fact that you’ve never hurt someone else by ignoring yourself. So you close your eyes completely, sigh, and say, “Don’t worry about it. I’ve never cared who you are.”

“I didn’t fuckin-” he stops, then splutters. “Sol, you unmitigated asshole!”

You flip him off with the first smile you’ve had all night and fall asleep to the beautiful sounds of your kismesis tripping over his own tongue.

\--

Aradia doesn’t come back the next night, either, apparently having left you in Eridan’s hands. He forces you to eat and drink and stop scratching and scowls at you for having the nerve to get taller and pails you when everything gets too much, which is less often than it was last night.

You’re not sure whether or not you’re thankful for that.

There’s something different about tonight, in committing yourself to this knowingly – or, more accurately, in not having a choice as to whether you do or not. You could kick Eridan out, sure, but you’d still end up on your knees in the ablutions chamber, jerking off to nothing but the possible feeling of relief. The schoolfeeds didn’t prepare you for the sheer immediacy of mating need – heightened libido doesn’t mean shit, your libido cycled already and you figured the highs were as high as it got and even then, if you felt like it, you could just ignore it and carry on with whatever you were doing and it’d go away eventually. This doesn’t go away. It fades, occasionally; you need _some_ time in the day to eat and sleep, and evolution seems to have recognised that fact, but other than that you have no choice.

When you have the opportunity to think about it, it scares you. You don’t push your body the way others do, like Eridan and Aradia FLARPing, or Nepeta hunting, but you control it nonetheless, pushing the boundaries that are important to you. You’re one of the most, if not the most powerful psionic on-planet, you can stay awake to the point where it should kill you and still maintain cognitive function, you breathe and eat and work for what you are. If you were a Helmsman, that awareness of yourself would extend further;  you would _be_ the ship in a way that fascinates you, despite everything. You’d have a degree of control over the entire world of all the ship’s inhabitants that nobody could subvert, once you broke conditioning.

Your own body wouldn’t be able to betray you, the way it’s betrayed itself. You didn’t have a good measure of how much you valued your autonomy until now.

“You should apologise to ‘Ray,” Eridan says, eating your food with relish.

You scowl at your own bowl of slop and refuse to eat it. The hungrier you are, the longer you can pretend anything about this is normal. “Yeah, your pale advice is bound to be _awesome_.”

“Yeah it is,” he says, and licks his spoon. You glance up and have to look down again before you get suckered into shutting him up the old-fashioned way, which is probably what he’s angling for. You don’t have the head for kismesis games when you’re like this. “’Cause I’ve been textin’ her an’ sendin’ her Captor status updates.”

You’re going to have to get ahold of his palmtop. “Good for you.”

“So now you know what it is,” he says. When you don’t answer, he raps two knuckles on the desk in front of you, pulling your attention back up. “To want somethin’ you can’t let yourself want.”

You shove the bowl of slop at him and smirk, showing fang, when he hisses at it splashing over onto his sleeve. “We all know you think you’re FF’s victim,” you say. When it fails to get a rise out of him, you let loose, the rant bubbling up to your lips from the land of truly regrettable things you actually manage to keep yourself from saying most of the time. “You took your shit out on her, ED! You hassled her and sulked and never came out with what you wanted for fear of rejection, you used all the power and tricks you had to keep her by your side, and it still all went to shit, and _good fucking riddance_ , because your head was so far up your ass that it was sticking back out of your neck.”

He scratches at the stain on his sleeve, not looking at you, but his fins are pinned flat and he’ll probably pop a hole in his sleeve if he scratches any harder, and you’re not fooled. “I was talkin’ about ‘Ray an’ Vris, ac-shoal-ly,” he says, drawing out the fishpun just to piss you off further, and then he laughs when you stomp off the ablutions chamber. “I’ll let her know what you think!”

You explode his palmtop and slam the door at the same time, the taste of hate in the air almost choking you.

\--

Your skin starts peeling off in long, thin strips down your back the next night and all you want to do is cocoon yourself in sopor, so you figure the danger of crawling out of your hiveblock and begging a quickie off a neighbour is over and you can boot Eridan out of your place to suffer the rest of this indignity in peace. He squawks the entire way - remember to eat, Sol, remember to drink, Sol, remember to not let ‘Ray kick my ass, Sol, remember to replace my palmtop, Sol - but eventually you manage to shut the door on him and survey your lonesome hiveblock.

If you try, you can still smell Aradia. It twists up your guts - which don’t need any help on that front, at the moment; you just want to sleep and _stop hurting_. If past experience has taught you anything, though, as soon as you close your eyes you’ll be confronted with visions of your moirail under your hands, and you can’t handle that along with all this physical bullshit.

You opt for the usual standby of mentally exhausting yourself with the internet. KK’s not on, as per fucking usual of late, and just when you could have really used the opportunity to talk to him. It’s probably ass o’clock where he is, to be fair, since Kanaya is online, but still. You’d like evidence of his existence past Terezi’s shitty photo.

\-- twinArmageddons [TA] has started trolling grimAuxiliatrix [GA] --  
TA: hey kn  
GA: Sollux  
GA: Be Careful  
GA: If You Keep This Up Conversing With Me More Than Once Per Half Sweep May Become A Habit  
TA: dear god anythiing but that  
GA: I Know Handling All This Is A Difficult Task  
GA: Sigh  
GA: As Has Become Apparent  
TA: do tell  
TA: iin excruciiatiing detaiil iif at all po22iible  
GA: Oh  
GA: I Wasnt Expecting That  
GA: Although It Is Your Fault So I Suppose I Have The Right To Complain At You About It  
TA: ii2 iit vk  
GA: When Is It Ever Not  
GA: Do I Really Have To Go Into Excruciating Detail  
GA: Would Not Merely Torturous Detail Suffice  
TA: ii ju2t want two know that 2he ii2nt me22iing wiith kk  
TA: well and you guy2 ii gue22  
TA: but ii mean ‘me22iing wiith’  
GA: She Isnt Quote Messing With Unquote Anyone But I Am Hard Pressed To Tell If She Is Messing With Anyone  
GA: Lets Change The Subject  
GA: This Is Both Confusing And Depressing  
TA: uh  
TA: 2ure  
GA: So Why Are You Engaging In Idle Chatter With Me  
TA: youre the only one of your ragtag team of adventurer2 onliine  
GA: And There Is Nobody Else  
GA: Forgive Me I Dont Mean To Pry But You Rarely Message Anyone Other Than Aradia And Even Then It Is Usually An Emergency  
TA: yeah that2  
TA: kn  
TA: you liike meddliing riight  
GA: Gasp  
GA: Such Acuity  
GA: Soon Terezi Will Be Demanding Your Assistance In Legal Cases  
TA: 2o  
TA: hypothetiically  
GA: For A Friend  
TA: yeah 2ure  
TA: no fuck that ii cant fiigure out how two make thii2 generiic  
TA: iim moultiing  
GA: Oh  
GA: !  
GA: Congratulations  
TA: fuck tho2e grat2 iin every oriifiice becau2e thii2 2hiit 2uck2  
TA: ii hurt aa  
GA: Oh  
GA: Well Consider My Congratulations Tactfully Retracted  
GA: What Happened  
GA: Is She Okay  
TA: 2he2 fiine ii gue22  
TA: ii havent talked two her but ed ha2 2o ii gue22 2he2 doiing fiine  
TA: and iit was the matiing 2hiit  
TA: iit  
TA: ii woke up and 2he wa2 riight there and ii couldnt thiink  
TA: 2he only managed two 2top me by holdiing me off wiith her p2iioniic2 and  
TA: what iif 2he hate2 me  
TA: liike how many tiime2 can ii fuckiing de2troy her before 2he throw2 up her hand2 and walk2 away for her own fuckiing 2afety  
TA: and why doe2 2he keep comiing back when all ii do ii2 lo2e control and hurt her  
GA: Sollux  
GA: I Mean This In The Most Platonic Way Possible  
GA: Shoosh  
TA: iit would be ea2iier iif i wa2nt a troll  
GA: Yes Of Course It Would  
GA: But Then You Would Not Have Experienced Any Of The Joys Of Being Aradias Moirail At All Or Met Any Of Us Or Contributed All You Have To Trollkind Which While You Tend To Downplay Your Achievements Are Actually Considerable And Will Only Continue To Grow  
GA: Life Is Messy And Often Painful But Dwelling On The Past Will Not Make It Any Better  
GA: All You Can Do Is Strive To Be Better And Ask Forgiveness For When You Fail  
GA: Capische  
TA: capii2che  
TA: doe2 kk have you watchiing hii2 2hitty moviie2 oh my god ii wa2 totally buyiing iit up untiil then  
GA: No The Advice Was Real The Capische Was Just A Touch Of Flair To Liven Up The Stream Of Text  
GA: Talk To Aradia  
GA: I Am Sure All Is Already Forgiven  
TA: yeah iit alway2 ii2  
TA: but iit 2tiill happened and iim 2tiill re2pon2iible  
GA: There Is A Difference Between Taking Responsibility And Letting It Haunt You  
GA: This Really Is Skirting Dangerously Pale But I Suggest You Learn The Former  
TA: a2 long a2 you dont pap me ii thiink were 2till iin the clear  
TA: thank2 kn  
TA: ii needed a mentally exhau2tiing conver2atiion and ii got one  
GA: From Anyone Else I Would Take That As Mean Spirited  
GA: But Youre Welcome  
GA: I Have Been Thinking About The Concepts For A While Anyway So It Helped Me Too  
GA: Clearly I Was Just Thinking Out Loud And Not Feelings Jamming  
TA: ab2olutely  
TA: about vk riight  
GA: Heavy Sigh  
GA: My Common Sense Says No But My Heart Says Its Worth Another Try  
GA: And Nobody Else Seems To Be Knocking Down My Door To Talk About Drone Contributions  
GA: Maybe Now Were Older It Wont Be So Stupid And Dramatic  
TA: you are talkiing about vrii2ka riight  
TA: vriiska 2tupiid dramatiic 2erket  
GA: Ha  
GA: Thats Fair  
GA: Oh Theyre Waking Up I Should Go  
GA: Karkat Doesnt Know How To Cook And The Less Said About Terezis Attempt The Better  
TA: yeah ii need two collap2e anyway  
TA: bye kn  
TA: thank2  
GA: Dont Mention It  
\-- grimAuxiliatrix [GA] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] --

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updoot: Officially on hiatus. I'm super busy and hate not being able to make any kind of schedule, so I'm writing the rest and then uploading it in short bursts when I finish it. Yes, this will take a while. No, the fic is not abandoned. Thank you kindly for bearing with me.


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome back! I missed you! Did you miss me?
> 
> This chapter is on a Tuesday for Reasons, but the next chapter and all after will be on fortnightly Thursdays - so the next chapter's going to be on the 12th, then the 26th, and so on. I know! A regular schedule! I'm excited too!

Aradia comes waltzing in a few nights later, when the last of your old skin has peeled off and your bones have stopped shifting into new and exciting configurations. She doesn’t even give you a chance to stammer out an apology, placing a hand over your sleep-ridden face and humming out a ‘shooooosh’ before clearing off your desk with one sweep of her arm and placing her own husktop there.

“I have a computer,” you say, for lack of anything else.

Aradia smiles at you. It’s tinged with relief, and even as it pulls a reluctant response out of you, you realise that she was as worried over the whole situation as you, if she was getting Eridan to check up on you. “Yes,” she says, and flicks the husktop open, the moment gone, “but _I_ have a surprise.” She takes your hand and steps back as her husktop wakes up, slotting herself neatly under your shoulder. You’re back to the same height ratios as before either of you decided to grow up, and it feels... nice. Something normal in the fucked-up extravaganza that is your life.

Trollian is open, when Aradia’s husktop finishes grinding its way to life. You make a note to get her a new one, once your credits have recovered from Vriska’s demolition of them, and say, “I have Trollian, too, AA, it’s not exactly new technology.”

“Wait for it,” she says, smug, and at that precise moment someone calls her. She leans in to click answer, and suddenly Karkat Fucking Vantas is there in all possible jittery, bad-connection glory. It’s definitely on his end.

“Hi again, asshole,” he says, and to your utter shame, you burst into tears.

\--

There’s no way you could possibly pretend that your meltdown didn’t just happen, but the consensus seems to be that everyone is going to deny it as a point of honour, so you don’t have to. Now that you’re looking, you can see why. Karkat doesn’t look far from a breakdown himself. His skin has nasty, tired undertones, and he’s so awake it’s obvious that he hasn’t slept properly in at least a few days. Then again, you can’t talk, crawling around to misery from the other end. Once you’re some semblance of okay, Aradia ruffles your hair in disgusting affection and wanders off to talk to your lusus. She is perfect and you do not deserve her sly, understanding nature.

“Where have you fucking _been_?” you ask Karkat, once you’re both done loudly acknowledging that everything is fine. It’s a valid question; you haven’t talked to him since Aradia was still out cold in Equius’ lab, going through her own moult. You sound a little too much like a needy matesprit, but you figure you’re justified on Eridan’s behalf. That is absolutely how quadrants work.

Karkat yawns, showing teeth. “Changing the world, nookwipe, where have _you_ been?” He leans back in his chair, and you finally realise that he’s wearing his uniform, albeit unbuttoned and obviously at the end of its wearability for the night. Did Aradia make him stay awake to talk to you? Has she been _colluding_ with - with Terezi, probably, you don’t want to contemplate the possibility that is Vriska Serket.

“You’re doing a great job,” you snark back at him to at least keep up the semblance of conversation, then consider shoving your foot in your mouth and chewing. Karkat’s always been pissy about not being able to do everything and shoulder every burden, and the last time you accidentally went there you almost lost your hearing.

Your preparatory cringing is useless, though. Karkat just rolls his eyes ceiling-wards and says, “Yeah,” in a tone you’re more used to hearing out of your own mouth. His self-loathing is an angry, active thing; he snarls at himself to make himself keep going and would chew through a wall if you sat him down in front of one. He isn’t meant to sound _defeated_.

You lean in a little. You don’t think you’ve ever asked Karkat if he’s okay and meant it before, and you’re not going to start now. The night you ask Karkat if he’s okay in actual concern is the end of the world, as far as you’re concerned. Instead, you clench your fists, dig your nails into your palms, and say, “Do you think this shit has gotten past us?”

He locks eyes with you, through shitty webcams and a distance you’re not allowed to know, and your skin flares up with goosebumps. You already know your answer - that there’s no going back now - and you think his might be the same. “I swear to fuck, if you’re coddling me-”

“Never,” you lie.

“Yes,” he says, finally. “Shit has gotten so beyond us that it may be lapping us around the equator. There is a path of shit that we must walk, Captor, and we are laying it in our own fucking way and acting surprised when we slip over.” He pauses for a moment to consider, then adds, “In other words, we happen to be in deep shit.”

“I gathered,” you say, as dryly as you can muster, and link your hands together to make them stop shaking. “How the _fuck_ did we end up in charge, KK, Feferi thinks fish puns are funny and Aradia’s half a robot and I can’t even fucking feed myself two times out of three, and Eridan is - is _Eridan_ , how the fuck-”

Karkat reaches towards his screen abortively, as if he can shoosh you through it, as if it’s his place. He pulls up short and you exhale in relief, slow enough that he won’t notice. You’ve had enough of  your relationships fucking up on you for the next few sweeps. Finally, he says, “I never expected this to actually happen,” subdued. When you frown, questioning, he gestures at himself. “This! _Revolution_? So far, my demonstrable leadership skills are, ‘do not often let Terezi and Vriska in the same room,’ and, ‘magnanimously sacrificing the last piece of topped flatbread in order to foster team morale, resulting in complete failure.’ We’re all going to _die_.”

“Yeah,” you say, and slump over, letting yourself bury your head in your hands. It’s the first time you’ve admitted that the chance of you - of all of you - actually winning this thing are miniscule, and had it sink in. From the silence after your agreement, it’s the first time Karkat’s said it outside of his own head, too. It’s a vicious, rational thought that sits oddly in your brain. _You are all going to die_ , it says, and it should feel like an old friend for all the times you’ve thought it, listening to voices and being masochistic, but something about it jars you.

Feferi is the Heiress. Karkat is a mutant. They were both obviously up for culling from the start. You’re only not a potential cull because you’ve got power leaking out your eyeballs, and Aradia would barely squeak through regulations - if someone decided to be an asshole about it, she’d be dead on Ascension. Terezi is too sharp for her own good and would mouth off to someone eventually, and Kanaya has a temper, and you’re all too invested in your lives to let the Empire sand the edges off you.

“We were dead anyway,” you say. Karkat laughs, a short _ha_ of contempt that you don’t know what you’d do without. You look up and his mouth is curled up in one corner, reluctantly. “Maybe not as fucked,” you add, fairly lending your consideration to both sides of the issue, “but _so fucking dead_.”

“Sorry, how fucking dead was that, exactly?” Karkat asks, but he’s still got the half-smile that’s his only smile on, and a weight feels lifted off your shoulders. Or shared, at least. “My feeble mutant brain cannot comprehend your complex logic and the astounding feats of mathematics that went into computing this value, did you perhaps want to exchange it for ‘totally’ dead or the antiquated ‘hella’ dead-”

You screw up a piece of scrap paper and throw it at the husktop’s webcam. “Two hundred percent dead,” you inform him while he stutters. “So what’d Aradia do to get a moment of your time, Glorious Leader?”

Karkat leaps on the change of subject as eagerly as you offered it. “Oh, you know,” he says, “she told me you were even uglier than you normally are, and I couldn’t resist seeing _that_ for myself. I thought it was impossible! You owe me so many credits you’re going to be funding the Karkat Vantas Mutant Rehabilitation Foundation for the next twenty sweeps.”

You bat your eyelashes at the camera. “Anything for a good cause, Mr. Vantas.”

“Speaking of ugly motherfuckers.” Karkat has the grace to look awkward, red blotches rising unevenly across his cheeks. “You saw Eridan?”

You roll your eyes. “Wow, I feel appreciated.” Before he can bluster in self-defense, you add, “He’s fine. I haven’t exactly been seeing much of him, I was working double-time on the rig with EQ before my moult hit, and we didn’t exactly talk much during. He’s been working with FF, anyway, on some highblooded etiquette shit. He says, anyway. And FLARPing with AA. They’d be your best bet for fucking romance gossip, you pailscraper.”

Karkat should be bitching at you, for sniping at him like that. Instead, his forehead is creased by a frown, and he says, “Feferi? He’s working _with Feferi?_ _”_

Eridan and Feferi is a bad combination. You’re glad Karkat’s still able to recognise that, even if he is suddenly besotted by the idiot. But still, you’d cut Eridan from gill to gill yourself before he let his precious feelings fuck up everything you’re working for, and you’ve done him the cold favour of making sure he knows it. You even think, a little reluctantly, that he may not even actually _want_ to fuck all of you over, and following that line of thought leads you to the conclusion that maybe Eridan cares enough about Karkat to want this to actually work, despite his history.

You’ve come to a lot of nasty realisations about yourself over the course of facing what this revolution actually means. Maybe, if you’re lucky, Eridan has done the same.

“Yeah, and FF hasn’t stuck him even once,” you say, wryly. “AA’s running the betting pool. Want in?”

Karkat’s face relaxes. He knows well enough that you’d bullshit him for his own good, but for some reason, he seems to believe your dismissal of the problem this time. “The Karkat Vantas Mutant Rehabilitation Foundation would like to place a bet on four more nights, and additionally that his wounded talk of betrayal will last exactly two hours until you singe his eyebrows off.”

“KK, if you were worried-” You cut yourself off. You and Karkat do not Do relationship talks. Well, no, that’s a lie. Karkat will do relationship talks until your hear canals rot, which means that you have never done relationship talks as a form of self defense, and also because it’s tedious as fuck.

He lifts his eyes skywards. “You’re not seriously asking me this.”

“FF hardly fucking counts as a moirail,” you point out. Karkat twists her ring on his finger, and you grit your teeth together. “I don’t either, but someone has to ask why you’re stepping into a puddle of fucking acid.”

“Kanaya already has,” Karkat says, and there’s something seething in his tone that makes you draw back. They’ve always _liked_ each other, what the fuck. On the other side of the connection, Karkat slumps over, burying his head in his hands. “When do I get to make a stupid, unconsidered decision, Sollux? When do I get to date someone who’s probably going to ruin everything just because I want to?”

“When you stop being important?” you suggest. At the tired glare he gives you, you hold up your hands in defense. “It’s not like I’m gonna stop you, KK, you’re a big scary adult troll now. Just keep in mind what you’re getting into.”

“If I ever forget, I’m sure I can count on one of you kind-hearted citizens to remind me.” Karkat rubs his face, then sits up again. “Look, no bullshit. We’re all fucked up. Stop wasting your energy on me and keep an eye on Aradia and Vriska. Our spiderbitch has been playing too nice for me to not get suspicious, and she and Aradia set this up. We need you and her okay more than we need Vriska if we’re going to stand any chance of pulling this off, so make sure you stay that way.”

You snap off a two-finger salute. “Sir, yes, sir!”

“Over and out then, you pustulent excuse for evolution.” Karkat returns your salute, then ends the video call. The room instantly feels ten times quieter, and you wish it didn’t. You talked about - well, important things, sure, but not really anything important to either of you at the moment. And it’s better than not having talked to Karkat at all, but you wish, just a little, that you had time to watch one of his shitty movies and lower your guards and actually talk about Aradia, and Vriska, and Eridan and Feferi and everyone else.

You still feel slightly better. Being called a pustulent excuse for evolution is apparently what does it for you.

—

Aradia recaptchas her husktop without asking you any questions about your conversation. Apparently, she’s decided she doesn’t need to; chipper smugness rolls off her in waves, which you assume means that she’s assuming that her surprise was a success. Which you can’t exactly argue with, given that Karkat verbally slapping you upside the head has done you good.

“I have FLARP tonight,” she tells you, chivvying you along to the ablutionsblock. She’s taken up her pale duties without a word about your incident, and even after Eridan and Kanaya assaulting you with advice, you still don’t know whether you should bring it up or let it lie. _If she says something_ , you decide. It’s the coward’s way out, you know, but looking at things realistically, Aradia’s always been better at charging headfirst at problems. She’ll bring it up if it is a problem. You can trust her in that.

“Why do I have to bathe if you’re the one FLARPing?” you whine, dragging your feet just enough to be annoying, but not enough to make her float you along.

“Because Eridan and I are both FLARPing, which means you get to grubsit the Heiress.” Aradia gives you a brisk push over the threshold and shuts the door. “We humble peasants scrub ourselves down before prostrating ourselves before royalty,” she adds, her voice barely muffled.

“I was going to go work on the rig,” you whine at the door.

“You can do both!” Aradia thumps the door. “Scrub _off_ , Sollux, you’ve still got dead skin everywhere.”

You sigh and prepare to scour off a layer or two of skin, so you’re presentable to the outside world. You still don’t understand why a fuchsiablood with an organic genocide machine for a lusus needs someone to grubsit her, but Aradia has her job in all this, and you’d do well to give her more faith than you have been. You can already tell that half your night is going to be wasted in Equius coming down with the vapours over Feferi’s presence, though.

You lose your calm when you step out of the ablutionsblock to see Aradia sitting in your chair, hair pulled over her shoulder as she stretches to do up a zip that runs the length of her spine on the bodysuit she’s wearing.

“Oh, good!” she says, when she sees you. You stand there, frozen like an idiot. “Zip me up?”

You don’t mean to - not after everything that just fucking happened, even you’re not that much of an idiot on purpose - but your voice comes out cold as you say, “What are you wearing?”

Aradia looks down at the black suit that hugs her from ankles to chin, the rust symbol that curls along her collarbones and dips to her waist. You can barely see her seams below it. “I am an adult,” she says, and smooths the cloth along her thighs. “Were you going to keep wearing your pupa clothes now that you’ve moulted?”

“I-” you say, because you hadn’t thought of it. “Who gives a shit, AA, why are you wearing a fucking psionic-style uniform? You know the stories as well as I do!”

Aradia sighs. “I can defend myself, Sollux-”

“Ask Vriska!” you snap. “Ask her how much a _tamed_ fucking psionic would go for as a stupid highblood’s toy pre-Ascension! Ask her how many she’s traded with her own hands!”

Aradia stands up. You’ve seen her angry, before. Angry, nothing; you’ve seen her tell the Heiress where to go two hours after getting off the operating table. Aradia is terrifying, when she wants to be, and right now she wants to be. She jabs a finger into your sternum and her weight is behind it, bruising and sharp. “You need to _stop,_ ” she snaps. Before you can respond, she jabs you again. “I love you, Sollux, but you seem to think that I’m some fragile, half-dead remnant of a girl you used to know, sometimes, and it is absolutely nothing like the reality staring you in the face. I am capable of making my own decisions! I know the risks! Stop assuming I’m a foolhardy six-sweep-old you need to look after, and stop assuming that you can dictate my actions to me because I don’t know any better!”

You swallow and almost step away, then plant your feet and hold your ground. Your hair is still stuck to your face, and all you’re wearing is a towel around your hips because you didn’t take clean clothes into the ablutionsblock with you, but you can’t give an inch. “You keep doing all this dangerous shit!” you say, and wave at her. “You decide to hatefuck Vriska, you’re daring the world to take you, and you’re already neck-deep in trying to overthrow the Empire, so fucking forgive me for worrying!”

Aradia slams her fist just below the V her collarbones form. The clang makes you wince. “We both know why you’re worrying! And it’s not because I’m doing something _dangerous_ , it’s because you don’t think I’m up to it!”

“I don’t think you need to call it down on yourself!” You can feel your horns sparking a little and stop to drag a breath through you before you accidentally set fire to something. The last thing you need is a swarm of angry, smoke-stoned bees descending on the two of you. “You’re daring anyone who wants a psionic,” you beg, when you’re under control again. “And FLARP’s practically a showcase for this fuckery anyway, AA, you know it is.”

“I know,” she says, exaggerated patience in her voice. “If you’d actually listened to me, instead of cutting me off, I’d have told you that we’re doing it on purpose. What do you think they see when Eridan shows up with a psionic ally, one who’s had a lot of expensive repair work put into her?”

You choke on the thought of Aradia as Eridan’s pet psionic.

She holds up her metal hand and begins counting off on her fingers. “A psionic who’s already protected. A FLARP team dependent on the poor robot rustblood who obviously can’t be very good, if she’s cosying up to a highblood and so _obviously_ near dead anyway. And someone who can afford high stakes, which are the only games we can play. It’s not like I lost my brain along with the rest of my organs,” she rebukes you.

“I just,” you mutter, before snapping your mouth shut.

“You just were being an idiot,” Aradia says, but puts her hand gently on your shoulder and squeezes. “I know what I’m doing, Sollux. And I’ll forgive you if you go put on some clothes.”

You reach up and put your hand over hers, without meeting her eyes. Then you go put on some clothes, because you’re feeling very naked all of a sudden.

—

Feferi and Eridan meet you at Equius’ hive, which is just about the last place you’d ever want to meet Feferi and Eridan. Luckily, Nepeta is there, and manages to keep Equius from going catatonic with nerves through sheer disrespect and smartassery. For all that you’re downright terrified of what she’ll do to you if you ever fuck up around Equius, you have to like Nepeta, sometimes.

Eridan gives you Generic Disdainful Look #8 before turning to Feferi. Given how your evening’s going, you almost expect some sort of overly-familiar gesture that you’re going to have to snarl at him for, but all he does is haul a stack of books out of his modus and dump them into Feferi’s arms. “This is a history of political power in the Fringe,” he says, tapping the lowest one, then names the other four. “An overview of how sectoring is carried out, one a’ the most thorough documentations a’ the chain a’ command an’ how it came to be I could find, the dispensations an’ responsibilities contracted to the jadebloods, an’-” his eyes barely flicker over to you, “-the same for those born psionic.”

Feferi stares down at her burden in horror. “Be reel, Erifin, I can’t read these all tonight!”

Eridan flicks his cape over his shoulder irritably. “You ain’t got much choice, Fef. I’ll go over your notes with you when me an’ ‘Ray are done FLARPin’.” His voice is clipped and his stance awkwardly stiff, keeping a constant distance from Feferi, trying hard to pretend that their history doesn’t exist. “’Ray, we should go.”

“Aye-aye, your Highbloodliness,” Aradia says sweetly, squeezing your shoulder before crossing to Eridan’s side. He holds out his arm grudgingly, a motion born in some kind of strange highblood concept of courtesy, but Aradia ignores it and grabs him by the collar instead. With no more warning than a quick, ‘Hup!’ she leaps into the air, dragging him along after her.

A snort from behind you draws your attention, and you turn to see Feferi balancing her books precariously on one hip, her free hand pressed firmly over her mouth and eyes scrunched up in amusement. Nepeta is openly sniggering, and the two of them share a look that makes Feferi have to swallow even more laughter down.

Surprisingly, it’s Equius who breaks the awkwardness of the lot of you. “If I may, your Highness?” he says, gesturing to Feferi’s books.

“Oh, I’ve got it!” Feferi chirps, completely bypassing all of Equius’ jangled nerves. “You have work to do, anywave, just stick me at a desk somewhere.”

Of course Feferi ends up sitting at the other end of your usual workbench. Of _course_ she does.

You had been looking forward to getting back to work, after everything. You’re still getting used to your limbs being a bit too long, and your psionics still feel a little strange when you’re doing delicate work, but you could have worked that out in one good work session. You could have made your body feel like yours again, instead of some dumb organic sack of bones and hormones.Instead, with the hopefully-future Empress tapping a stylus against her cheekbone and looking maudlin at books that are older than anything else on-planet, you’re too aware of the space you take up, jerky and uncoordinated as you spend too much energy on trying to not be jerky and uncoordinated.

This must be what it feels like to be Equius. Ugh.

“Ugh!” Feferi echoes your thoughts, slamming her book shut before drooping in her chair. “Sole-lux-”

You fumble the wires you were connecting and grab for them before they can get hopelessly lost in the tangle in front of you. Tonight would have been so much easier if Nepeta hadn’t had to go hunting with her lusus. You’re not made for entertaining people. “What?”

Feferi looks at you miserably, the drama of her expression exaggerated by her goggles. “There’s no wave this can be reconciled! Araydia and Karkrab tell me what conchessions I need to be making to keep the lowblooded populocean happy, then Erifin dumps all this carp aboat how everyfin is run post-Ascension and none of it fits together! I don’t minnow what they’re expecting me to do.”

You stare at her like an antlerbeast caught in dronelights. She stares back at you, apparently genuinely interested in the result if you can make your tongue work. “Uh,” you say, intelligently.

“They should not have expectations,” Equius says, from across the room. Both you and Feferi  twist to look at him, and he jerks his gaze back down to his work. “That is. They should not be commanding you to follow their expectations, should you become Empress.”

Feferi twists a lock of her horrorterror hair around her fingers as she looks assessingly at Equius. “I thought you approved of Her Condescension.”

Equius blanches a little, equalling your own antlerbeast impression. “It is not a matter for me to approve or disapprove of.”

The Heiress to the Alternian Empire considers Equius’ words for a moment, then blows a raspberry. “You’re a citizen of the Empire, Equifish! I can tell you right glubbing now that eferry single other citizen has an opinion aboat the matter.” More quietly, she adds, “I need all the kelp I can get.”

“I meant nothing by my words.” Equius looks down at the plans spread over his desk, and picks up a soldering iron. “My opinion or approval would change nothing of you and your Ancestor, nor should it. Neither should it have any effect on the decisions of leadership.”

“Huh,” Feferi says, after a long moment, then rests her chin on her hand. Conversation apparently over, she reopens her book and begins tapping her stylus against her cheek again. Equius continues his work like he was never interrupted, although you can tell he’s still a bit alarmed at being talked at by a Peixes - join the club, you think. After watching them for a moment longer, to make sure that nobody is going to spontaneously combust through the sheer power of opposing ideologies, you turn back to your work.

You could almost get used to this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just to add an awkward note to my return, because it wouldn't be my return if I didn't make it awkward, I would like to ask you guys to not leave comments along the lines of 'I thought this was never coming back!' or 'What took you so long?'. Being excited that the hiatus is over is totally cool! But my writerly ego is a glass vase in an earthquake factory, so anything even vaguely shame-y will have me turtling back into the Land of Caves and Depression, ne'er to be seen again. And nobody wants that, so, um, please don't?
> 
> Okay! Awkwardness over! Time for confetti.


	18. Chapter 18

You manage to keep your foot out of your mouth for an unprecedented week, which is frankly amazing given that you’ve apparently been charged with the care and feeding of Feferi Peixes, along with everything else you had to worry about. Luckily, it’s not like she terrifies you out of your wits - oh, wait. Still, for all that she’s the child of horrorterrors and helping her out is quite likely to get you and everyone you’ve ever managed to scrounge up a single solitary shit for horrifically murdered, you have to admit that she grows on you.

You will take it to your grave, but you’re even starting to get used to the fishpuns.

She spends most of her time muttering about rules and laws and who exactly she has to win to her side as soon as you’re all flung into space, pacing around Equius’ workshop and waving her hands as she talks. Sometimes she wanders off with Nepeta, and comes back bloody and smug to announce that there’s food ‘if you nerds want any!’ Sometimes she crawls under a desk and takes a nap, deep circles under her eyes the only sign of how worried she really is about the responsibility that falls on her shoulders, and you learn that your Heiress has a soft snore that makes her fins flutter in her sleep.

You wonder if Her Imperial Condescension snores. You don’t think you really want to know.

She also saves you from ruining your excellent foot-taste-free streak by being the one to discover Nepeta curled up in a pile of robot parts in the corner, sweat trickling down her face as she breathes. “Equius?” she asks, and the hesitancy in her voice makes you both snap to attention. Once you realise what’s going on, you whip back around and concentrate on your work, feeling a blush burn down your neck. Of course Nepeta would be moulting, after you. It was embarrassing enough having people witness you in that state; you don’t want to do the same to Nepeta, especially since Equius is likely to get protective.

Equius murmurs to Nepeta, just quiet and rumbly enough that you can’t make out what he’s saying. Then he crosses the room to you, and says, his voice still lowered as if the lot of you have been transported to a medicull centre, “Captor, I must attend to Nepeta.”

You shrug, baffled by why he’s telling you the obvious. “I’ll be here when you get back.”

He hesitates. “I had intended to assist Nepeta throughout the duration of her moult. It would be beneficial for her to have a peaceful hive.”

You wince, because you can’t exactly blame him for kicking you out based on noise levels; last night you’d fucked up a circuitboard right after etching it, and the rant you treated your lab partners to got a standing ovation from Feferi, with favourable comparisons to Karkat. Still - “ _You_ _’re_ going to look after her,” you say, alarm rising like bile in your throat.

Equius frowns, eyebrows disappearing below his cracked glasses. “It is my duty.”

“Don’t,” you say, uncomfortably aware of Feferi watching you and Nepeta  doing her utmost to sleep in the corner. “I mean, it’s not a good idea. Take it from someone who knows, EQ.”

You expect an argument. No, actually, you expect Snooty Douche to take over for Equius Zahhak and inform you that maybe it’s not a good idea for you poor little lowbloods, but highbloods are Constitutionally Superior and are more than capable of nursing their poor, beleaguered moirails. Instead, Equius’ frown slowly relaxes, and to your utter surprise, he nods once, a jerk of his head more than anything. “I cannot leave her alone,” he says, and actually waits for your advice.

You do your best to not trip over your tongue. “Checking in with food and stuff should be fine,” you manage to stammer out. “Constant presence, not so much.”

He inclines his head to you again and then walks back to Nepeta, placing a hand on her shoulder before scooping her up with more care than you’ve seen him use with anything. It feels like an intrusion to watch them, so you turn back to the replacement circuitboard and pretend that it is incredibly fascinating.

“Put me down, stinklord,” Nepeta says as Equius carries her out of the room.

“No,” Equius says, with a thin veneer of patience made of pity that reminds you of Aradia, a little.

—

For all that you expected Equius to be put off his work by worry for Nepeta, it doesn’t happen. He throws himself into the work instead, only stopping to check on Nepeta like clockwork. You almost feel like you should be giving them some privacy - fuck knows you didn’t want anyone around in your hive when you were moulting, let alone some guy you hardly know - but Equius makes no move to kick you out, and if you left he’d be left with nothing to work on. The two of you have reached the point where you need to work together, Equius fiddling with hardware and you ruining several prototypes with shitty firmware. It’d almost be fun, except for the deadline.

You’d thought that you’d sorted all the personal question trouble out, since you’ve both been civil and - dare you say it? - even acquaintance-style friendly as you’ve been working together. Equius apparently needs something to distract him from Nepeta’s predicament, however, and your intent concentration on the rig as you line it up with your own body seems to be it.

“Will you choose to be a Helmsman if the Heiress rises to power?” he asks you one evening, abruptly. It’s just the two of you in the basement, since Nepeta recovered enough to declare herself ‘pawrifically bored!’ and Feferi decided to take it as a challenge. The two of them have spent the past couple of nights reading passages from Eridan’s boring-ass history books dramatically and inserting as many puns as they can into the poor, innocent sentences. You like puns, but there’s a limit. (The limit is obviously two.)

You let the tips of your tongue poke out between your dumb teeth as you carefully copy a blueprint onto your hand. Praise the Empire for ambidexterity.  “I’m just making sure it all lines up,” you tell him absently, focusing on drawing a node between your knuckles. “We’ll make it generic later.”

“I was not referring to our previous conversations,” Equius says. The stink of solder reaches your nose and you wrinkle it in a vain attempt to get away. For all that everything has smelled like solder for the past week, it still manages to be uniquely gross. “I am curious as to what function you see yourself performing, if your plan comes to fruition.”

“Not my plan,” you say, and flex your hand. You’re going to have to make some kind of glove to route the wires through, to reduce stress breakage. Oh well, that’s Equius’ job. “I don’t know, EQ, why?”

He doesn’t answer, for long enough that you almost forget he’s there. You’ll have to bunch things like so to make sure that everything has access - ports _here_ and _here_ , deep enough that you’d have to worry about them intersecting. You flick through papers until you find the left-arm-from-the-side view and adjust the angle a bit. You’ll have to tailor it to each Helmsman anyway, but the basic form should be a good place to start.

“I was merely curious,” Equius says, eventually.

You nod, distracted, as you get to your shoulder and need to float the pen to reach where you need to draw. Then, realising that you should probably answer with actual words, you repeat, “I don’t know. Depends on FF, I guess.”

There’s another long silence, which Equius breaks once more. “What would you work towards, if you had your preference?”

You snort, switching to your other arm. “My preference, right.” Before Equius can throw a hissy fit about lowbloods and their uppity ways, you say, “Whatever. Being a private Helmsman with one of these rigs might not be so bad.” It’s not like you don’t _like_ the idea of being in control of a giant hunk of metal hurtling through space. When you put it like that, it’s badass as fuck. It’s more the ‘lifeless indoctrinated husk’ part that you have problems with.

You don’t notice that Equius doesn’t answer, lost in piecing together connector and chip placements.

—

Of course, not everything can be imagining how awesome it would be to be a spaceship, so long as the Empire didn’t own you. Nepeta finishes her moult and promptly informs Equius that she and Feferi are tired of hanging out with nerds, so they’ll be doing strife practice while you’re doing boring nerd things. You give Feferi an uneasy look at that, remembering your conversation about Gl’bgolyb’s disapproval of Feferi being in harm’s way, but you figure she knows her lusus best.

Eridan should be pissed, with Feferi skipping out on his advice, more often than not. When Feferi tells him, though, he just shrugs wearily and collapses into the seat beside you. It’s become a thing, for all of you to finish out the night in Equius’ basement before going your separate ways. Feferi and Nepeta fix each other up, you and Equius pack everything away, Eridan cleans his rifle, and Aradia does her robobody maintenance. You will never, ever let anyone know, since you’re kind of morally obligated at this point to bitch and moan whenever anyone forces you out of the hivestem, but you actually kind of like winding down the day with them all. You’re even starting to get used to rubbing elbows with the Heiress, for all that she makes your teeth itch with doom.

It’s not perfect. Feferi and Eridan are still awkward about talking to each other - which you don’t disapprove of - and conversation tends to be limited unless Aradia’s feeling enthusiastic. You hate conversation, though, so it hardly matters to you. It gives you the time to grind your teeth over any new bruises Aradia’s collected, since Aradia’s already clearly said she doesn’t want you sticking your nose in her FLARP business.

That crashes to a halt the one night Eridan and Aradia get back late.

They’re usually punctual enough within an hour or so, and even you don’t start worrying until it’s been an hour past that. Three hours late and you’re pacing around the room, Nepeta watching you like prey and Equius quietly ignoring you. Feferi had to leave, to get back to her lusus before dawn, and you’re running out of time as well when Eridan and Aradia stagger down the stairs, his thin frame bearing up hers. Rust blood oozes slowly from a cut on her forehead, and more that you can’t see the source of soaks her clothes, and Eridan’s where he’s pressed against her. To his credit, he doesn’t stop and demand one of you to take over, instead limping his way to the nearest chair and dropping your moirail into it as gently as his exhausted muscles can manage.

You’re on your knees in front of Aradia before you process crossing the space between you, holding her chin in your hands as you gently tilt her head to the light to get a good look at her cut.

“Hey, Sollux,” she says, her voice thick with fatigue - and you hope _only_ fatigue. Her pupils are slow to respond to light, but she pats clumsily at your face when she realises what you’re doing. “I’m all right. Eridan checked me before we left. Di’n’t wanna fly with a head wound.”

“Oh, _Eridan_ checked you,” you say, layering as much sarcasm into your voice as possible as you grab a clean rag and hold it to Aradia’s head. “You’re right, I’ll just go then-”

“Fuck off, Captor,” Eridan says, unenthusiastically drawing up a chair next to Aradia’s. “It ain’t the time for this.”

“What happurrned?” Nepeta asks, and you want to snap at her for bothering with the puns while your moirail is bleeding and dazed in front of you.

“It was a fuckin’…” Eridan waves his hand, looking for the word. “Rout. They’re sick a’ me killin’ their lusii. We had to accept some pretty long odds, an’ it woulda been fine, but one a’ them was an unregistered psionic.” He stares gloomily at Aradia. “Fuckin’ rude.”

You decide that ignoring Eridan is probably going to be the best decision for everyone’s immediate survival. “Anything broken?” you ask Aradia, dabbing brusquely at the splotches of blood all down her face and neck.

“No,” she says, drawing it out in an alarmingly sing-song fashion. “I’ve just got to clean myself out and get some oil. It was a long walk back.”

“You’re tellin’ me,” Eridan grumbles, from the Land of the Justly Ignored.

“Good,” you say, and stand up to rinse out the rag. All you’ve succeeded in doing is smearing half-dry, sticky blood all over, but now that you’ve stopped your hands start shaking and you can’t stop the words pouring out of your lips. “No more FLARP, AA. We agreed that you’d only FLARP if it wasn’t dangerous.”

Aradia presses her hand against the cut on her forehead, spreading the blood around even more, and looks at you through one open, blown-out eye. “We agreed I’d FLARP if there was no Vriska. Tonight was fun.”

You drop the rag in the sink and fumble after it. “ _Fun?_ ”

“Until it turned bad,” Aradia says, obstinate to the bitter end. “Just because you hate taking any action doesn’t mean that the rest of us do. I was finally getting to _do_ something. I have to clean out my leg.”

“You said,” Eridan says, but in a once-in-a-lifetime display of helpfulness drags out a case of maintenance tools from under the workbench across from yours. “Gimme your leg, ‘Ray.”

“Hands _off!_ _”_ you snarl, and everyone freezes. Distantly, you’re aware that sparks are crawling down your arms, but you have had enough. Enough of Aradia being put in harm’s way. Enough of FLARP always getting taken out on the lowbloods, and only the justice that they can get away with. Enough of highbloods changing their standards and treating you as either shit to scrape off your shoe or a pet to get grabby over.

“I have to clean out my leg,” Aradia insists.

“Yeah, well I have to know that you’re going to come back alive when you leave!” You snatch the case of tools away from Eridan with your psionics, and dig through it so you don’t start throwing things. “I’m your moirail, AA, and as useless as I can fucking get, it’s my job to make sure you don’t do stupid shit. No more FLARPing.”

“She ain’t your fuckin’ barkbeast, Captor,” Eridan butts in.

You finally find the brush you’re looking for and pull it out, before giving up and shoving it away again. If you try to do anything delicate, you’ll just break something. “Fuck _off_ , ED.” Your hands shake before you ball them into fists. “You’re the one who used her as a meatshield in the first place, so you can shove it-”

“-You might wanna rethink that, Captor,” Eridan says, speaking over you without shouting. He takes a moment to pull off his glasses and starts cleaning them with his cape, showboating for all he’s worth while you’re too busy sputtering in rage to be coherent. “I ain’t wastin’ a psionic as a meatshield, how stupid do you think I am?”

“Can we stop talking about me over my head?” Aradia asks, sinking down in her chair. “I think we’re scaring Equius.”

“You don’t give a shit about AA,” you hiss at Eridan. “You don’t have a single scratch on you! Or, wait, sorry, you hurt your ankle. Did you twist it running away?”

Eridan’s eyes go stony. “I ain’t gotta prove anything to you just ‘cause you’re hysterical, Sol. ‘Ray got hurt. It happens.”

“You’re both stupid,” Aradia mutters, then lunges and hooks her fingers in your sleeve. She drags you back two stumbled steps, tugging you into her lap and wrapping her arms around you so that you can’t get up again. “Sollux, I got hurt. I’m fine now. I want to clean up and go home. Stop _arguing_.”

“I’m not letting him-” you protest, but Aradia cuts you off.

“You’re not letting anyone.” She nudges her shoulder into your back uncomfortably, forcing you to pay attention to her. “I want you to stop. It wasn’t Eridan’s fault.” More quietly, she adds, “I had to kill people today. Stop freaking out about my headache and help me with what actually hurts.”

You sag in her arms and close your eyes. There’s not going to be any talking to her about the continuance of her FLARP career now, even if this is even more of a reason that she needs to stop. She was meant to only be playing non-fatal games; that the stakes have risen whether or not she and Eridan wanted them to - and you have your doubts on that point, given your kismesis’ lack of compunction about killing and lack of care about your moirail’s safety - means that there’s no chance she’d be able to go back to the old rules. Nobody will be willing to play with them, now that it looks like they’ve tricked a team into being murdered.

Eridan picks up the bag of tools you abandoned and heaves them at your chest, grimacing as he does so. “Tend to my psionic, pissblood,” he says, just to rile you up. Aradia grips your wrist, but all you do is flip him off with the other hand and wearily grab the brushes you’ll need to clean out your moirail’s knee.

—

Eridan falls asleep, lolling in his chair with utter disregard for the safety of his surroundings. You keep Aradia awake by talking to her, coaxing the full story out of her as you work stiff brushes and small hooks and even a fine-tipped vacuum that Equius puts in your line of sight without further drawing your attention, not fully recovered from  watching you hiss at Eridan. You press her for details that you don’t particularly care about, not wanting her to fall asleep even when she’s less dazed and her eyes seem normal again. The only subject you don’t push her on is that of the two trolls she killed, since her mouth goes hard and flat around the words.

Her leg is beaten up, to put it mildly. The rest of her too, but flesh heals. The shine of her leg from the knee to the top of her boot is gone, the ragged threads of her bodysuit over the area showing that it was a deliberate drag. Her other leg is well enough, so she must have gone on her metal one to spare her other. By the time you finish getting out all the grit and sanding the surface smooth, her eyes are half lidded and her willingness to talk gone. She offers you her arm silently, and you can tell from a quick look that it’s going to require even more attention. Green blood has dried in sticky rivulets all down it, and drips running into the finger joints mean that it’s dried sticky on the inside, too. It won’t have gotten inside the waterproofing, but you’re going to have to remove the plating to clean her arm properly.

Equius clears his throat behind you and you almost jump out of your skin. Aradia smiles, because she saw him coming and takes delight in your misery.

“The sun is rising,” Equius informs you, haltingly.

You blink at him, and in that moment, a wave of saved-up exhaustion sweeps over you. You wipe your arm across your forehead - feeling blood stick there, too. Good, now you and Aradia match. “We have to go?” you ask, too tired to not be blunt.

Equius looks affronted, despite having known you for some time now. “I merely wished to inform you that I am retiring. You may wait out the day here.”

Weary, you nod, and go to find some screwdrivers. Aradia’s arm won’t clean itself.

—

It falls to you to keep Aradia awake, even if you think you’re more dizzy and weary than she is, at this point. Eridan, in a characteristic display of uselessness, has curled up inside his cape and been fast asleep for hours. You set Aradia up with a husktop once you’re fairly certain that she’s not going to die if you leave her to herself and then install yourself at your usual computer. To your exhausted surprise, Terezi is online. You’re not sure whether it’s a good or bad thing that their ragtag team has been easier to get ahold of lately.

— twinArmageddons [TA] has started trolling gallowsCalibrator [GC] —   
TA: 2up.   
GC: 1 T4K3 3XC3PT1ON TO TH1S QU3ST1ON, YOUR HONOUR   
GC: SUCH L34D1NG QU3ST1ONS C4N H4V3 NO PL4C3 1N 4 COURT OF L4W   
GC: YOU W1LL H4V3 TO R3PHR4S3 1F YOU W1SH TO CONT1NU3 TH3 1NT3RROG4T1ON 4PPL3B3RRY!   
TA: not twoday, tz.   
GC: W3LL 1 SUPPOS3 1 C4N GR4NT 4N 3XC3PT1ON 4T GR34T H4RDSH1P TO MYS3LF >:[   
GC: WH4T H4V3 YOU DON3 NOW?   
TA: wow. talk about leadiing que2tiion2.   
GC: TH3 3XCEPT1ON W4S FOR M3 OF COURS3   
GC: THE QU3ST1ON ST4NDS!   
GC: DON’T M4K3 M3 R3GR3T L34V1NG YOU ON YOUR OWN >:[   
TA: aa got hurt flarpiing wiith ed.   
TA: ii ju2t fiinii2hed cleaniing her up and need a dii2tractiion 2o ii fall a2leep wiithout murderiing hiim.   
GC: W3LL, 1 WOULD H4T3 FOR YOU TO B3 CONV1CT3D OF MURD3R OF YOUR B3TT3RS W1THOUT M3   
GC: W3V3 GON3 TO GROUND FOR 4 WH1L3   
GC: 4S MUCH 4S YOU C4N W1TH 4 DR4GON FOLLOW1NG YOU 4ROUND 4NYW4Y   
TA: what? why?   
TA: we’re runniing out of tiime before a2cen2iion, tz!   
GC: Y3S TH4T H4S B3COM3 R4TH3R OBV1OUS   
GC: WOULD 1T B3 CR4SS OF M3 TO S4Y TH4T 3V3N TH3 BL1ND G1RL C4N T3LL   
GC: K4N4Y4 1S MOULT1NG   
TA: oh.   
GC: 4ND 1 DONT KNOW HOW MUCH OF A D1FF3R3NC3 W3R3 M4K1NG 4NYW4Y   
TA: no. nope. not lii2teniing two prediictiion2 of everythiing faiiliing.   
TA: not after aa ju2t got hurt tryiing to keep the empre22’ fuckiing lu2u2 fed.   
GC: K4RK4T W4S 4TT4CK3D   
TA: fuck.   
GC: VR1SK4 S4V3D H1M   
TA: FUCK.   
GC: QU1T3   
GC: 4LTHOUGH 1 WOULD H4V3 4PPR3C14T3D ‘BL4ST’   
TA: ok 2o how bad ii2 iit.   
GC: HOW B4D   
GC: W3LL   
GC: K4N4Y4 4ND K4RK4T H4V3 B33N 4RGU1NG N34RLY FROM TH3 ST4RT OF TH1S V3NTUR3 4BOUT TH3 PROP3R W4Y OF GO1NG 4BOUT TH1NGS 4ND NOW 34CH OF TH3M 1S 4TT3MPT1NG TO US3 TH1S 3V3NT 4S 3V1D3NC3 1N TH31R SN1P1NG 4RS3N4L   
GC: 3MPH4S1S ON 4RS3   
GC: K4N4Y4 1S 4LT3RN4T3LY 4RGU1NG FROM 4 CUP3 4ND THROUGH 4 DOOR S1NC3 SH3’S MOULT1NG 4ND TH3 HORMON3 SOUP M34NS TH4T SH3 WONT STOP GO4D1NG K4RK4T 4ND K4RK4T H4S PR3D1CT4BLY CONV1NC3D H1MS3LF TH4T W1TH K4N4Y4 H4T1NG H1M MOR3 LOUDLY TH4N H3 C4N H4T3 H1MS3LF TH4T K4N4Y4 1S H1S ON3 TRU3 K1SM3S1S 4ND TR1PS F4C3 F1RST 1NTO TH3 GO4D1NG   
GC: 4PPL3B3RRY   
GC: 1 H4V3 N3V3R B33N SO GL4D TO B3 4SH3N W1TH YOU   
TA: ii feel liike ii 2hould take offen2e but what the FUCK ii2 happeniing, we 2hould have never let any of you out of our 2iight.   
GC: 4GR33D   
GC: W3 4R3 NOT TO B3 TRUST3D 4T 4LL   
GC: M34NWH1L3 VR1SK4 1S PR33N1NG WH3N3V3R SH3S 1N K4N4Y4S L1N3 OF S1GHT 4ND 1M 3V3N MOR3 WORR13D 4BOUT TH4T   
GC: SOM3TH1NG 1S ROTT3N 1N TH3 ST4T3 OF TROLL D3NM4RK   
GC: M4YB3 K4N4Y4S SK1N   
TA: ew.   
TA: regardle22 of how terriible everythiing ii2, you do not want two be 2eriiou2 about that remark. you wiill regret iit when you’re moultiing.   
GC: SK1N OOZ3   
GC: 1T SM3LLS L1KE PROT31N DR1NK   
GC: 1 WOND3R 1F W3 G41N NUTR1T1ON 1N TH3S3 TRY1NG T1M3S BY 34T1NG OUR SH3D SK1N   
TA: wow thank2 tz ii diidn’t thiink ii could forget how terriible our earliier conver2atiion wa2 but ii ju2t diid.   
TA: ii’m goiing two go beat my head agaiin2t the wall for 2iix 2weep2 now.   
GC: DO 1 T4ST3…   
GC: SOUR GR4P3S >:D   
TA: that doe2n’t even make any 2en2e.   
GC: TH1S S1TU4T1ON 1S HURT1NG MY PUN C4P4B1L1T13S >:[   
GC: 1 DONT SUPPOSE MR 4NT1SOC14L H4S 4NY T1PS OR TR1CKS ON M4N4G1NG HORMON3 DR1V3N 1NS4N3 P3OPL3   
GC: 1 W1LL R3FR41N FROM 4SK1NG 4BOUT PUN T1PS 4S YOU 4R3 US3L3SS 1N TH4T 4R3N4   
TA: liie2 and fuckiing 2lander.   
TA: and ii have no fuckiing iidea, ii’m the one who managed two pii22 off liiterally everyone iin thii2 buiildiing.   
TA: ju2t riide iit out.    
TA: oh and 2end vk away, that worked for me.   
GC: TH4NKS 4 BUNCH 4PPL3B3RRY   
GC: 1 W1LL NOW PROC33D TO DO TH3 OPPOS1T3   
TA: double 2tandard2.   
GC: YOU’R3 NOT 3V3N TRY1NG   
GC: FR4NKLY 1 3XP3CT 4 L1TTL3 MOR3 3FFORT 1N TH1S R3L4T1ONSH1P   
GC: ON3 M1GHT S4Y TH4T YOU 4R3 F41L1NG TO C4PTOR MY 4TT3NT1ON   
GC: 4ND ON TH4T NOT3 1 4M L34V1NG 1N D1SGUST   
GC: 1N 4LL S1NC3R1TY    
GC: c3<   
— gallowsCalibrator [GC] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —   
TA: thii2 ha2 not been a good chat for eiither of u2.

Aradia has fallen asleep with the husktop you loaned her as a pillow, her hair engulfing the poor thing entirely. Most of her face is hidden, and if you could ignore her visible bruises and the blood soaked into her clothes, the fresh shining of her metal limbs makes it seem like nothing even happened. Except it did, and you can’t pretend it didn’t just because Aradia wants you to. Normally your apathy and her willingness to throw herself headlong into any course of action that suits her balance out, but she sweeps herself away, sometimes, and you can’t stop her.

And it’s usually your fault.

So you have Aradia, and Terezi has Karkat, and neither of you can Fix It. And in calling each other idiots, your own idiocy is exposed.

You pull your hands down your face, very carefully thinking of nothing at all, and then turn your computer off. Before you can start thinking again, you go and curl up by your moirail, who is still your moirail for better or worse, and close your eyes. As you drift off, a warm arm insistently tugs at you until you press your face into Aradia’s side, and you find a gloomy kind of peace before losing the fight to stay awake entirely.  



	19. Chapter 19

By unspoken agreement, none of you mention the incident beyond the necessary. And your arrangement of all working out of Equius’s basement continues, which you’re surprisingly relieved about. Normally, having people in your working area leads to a strong murderous urge, but being able to concretely know where Aradia and where anyone who thinks dragging her into a fight equals a good time are seems to be a benefit that outweighs the drawbacks of having people constantly talking around you.

When you snipe at Eridan about him not being able to leave you alone, in the hopes of finding out why he’s hanging around and poring over etiquette with Feferi instead of feeding her lusus, all he does is shove his glasses further up his nose so he can give you a scathing glare. Aradia, bored with her lack of duties, hops up on your workbench and crosses her legs, then pops a sourgrub into your mouth when you open it to complain. “We glutted Gl’bgolyb for a bit,” she says, before picking out a sourgrub from the packet she carries for herself. “Now we get to whip our Heiress into shape.”

“I feel whipped,” Feferi says, disconsolately. “This etiquette is useless! Shoaldn’t all of them be following my lead?”

The best thing about this arrangement is that you can practically hear Eridan grinding his shark maw from across the room. “Fef-”

“I minnow!” Feferi slaps the book she’s angry at tonight shut. “Isle have to conform to expectations in order to fasealitate a smooth transocean between reigns. Halibut I don’t fin it’s as important as you do! This is why I _have_ you, and Araydia, and Karkrab! You’re the ones who are going to manage all this for me, and if I make any mistakes then too bad, I’m the Empress!”

“Fef,” Eridan grates out. Huh. Maybe Feferi’s finally managed to kick over that pedestal, even if Eridan insists on cementing it down. You turn half your attention back to your work, but keep listening to the conversation, because Feferi owning Eridan will never not be hilarious, even if circumstances are conspiring to be Dire. “We’re goin’ to be a handful a’ fuckin’ children up against the rest a’ the fuckin’ Empire-”

“My Empire!” Feferi interjects. “And it’s only going to be my Empire if I can actually win it. I don’t fin a bunch of reading is reely going to kelp me with the Imperial line of succession and my plaice in it!”

“Have you ever known a _nice_ highblood?” Eridan snaps, his lip curling as he spits the word. “Think hard, Fef.”

Feferi’s just out of your line of sight, as you braid together a bunch of wires and try not to lose which one you need for grounding everything - you’re _really_ going to have to sort out your colour-coding before letting anyone else touch this, it’s a mess and is likely to get whoever tries to reverse-engineer it killed. Somewhere behind all that, you note the way Aradia leans back on her arms, which she only does when she’s considering something important. You hope Feferi’s doing the same, or is at least aware she’s being assessed.

“Gamzee?” Feferi finally says. You snort - and interestingly, so does Equius. “He’s harmless!” she protests against the two of you and Eridan’s despairing look, with the assurance of someone a degree removed from the situation.

“He broke TZ’s nose,” you say.

“His behaviour is hardly exemplary of a true highblood,” Equius grumbles, from low in his chest. They may be the first negative words he’s willingly volunteered in the presence of the Heiress to the Alternian Empire, and he keeps his attention on his work the whole time, as if he can pretend it didn’t happen if he doesn’t acknowledge it.

Feferi’s silent for a long moment. You can practically feel her eyes darting back and forth between you and Equius. “Fine,” she says, the fight gone out of her voice. “We’re all terrible.” Beside you, Aradia shifts her weight again. You lean your arm along her thigh and she nudges back, the two of you sharing recognition of the fact that she didn’t even offer herself as an example of a Nice Highblood. And, well, you have your problems with highbloods, and you’d hardly call any of them ‘nice’ - but for all she terrifies you, Feferi’s come the closest to that label of all the highbloods you’ve had the misfortune to encounter. “What’s your point, Eridan?”

Eridan straightens and adjusts his cape. “Fef-”

“Stop coaxing and condescending to me.” Feferi’s voice is a lash, and even you flinch, apart from her and the conversation as you are. “Your point, Eridan.”

Suddenly, she sounds like an Empress, not an Heiress. You’re not certain as to whether that’s a good thing or not. Eridan straightens up, shoulders back, chin up so he can look down his nose at the tone of her voice. Icily, he says, “We’re cruel, Fef. We’re power-hungry an’ we only consider our own ambitions. We’re a den a’ fuckin’ eels an’ if any a’ the ones in power up there-” he points up, his scowl getting deeper, “-see you waver after all a’ their plans get upset by a change in leadership, they’ll arrange an accident for you an’ get on with things without blinkin’ twice. Such a shame, it’ll be. They’ll just have’ta wait until the next Heiress shows up, an’ in the meantime here’s someone who can run things until then. Wouldn’t dream a’ makin’ a puppet throne.” He thumps a hand down on his pile of books. “So you need to know how to manipulate them, ‘cause they ain’t gonna hesitate.”

Metal striking the floor rings out, and you jump. You always figured Feferi’s trident couldn’t be real gold - too soft - but you know for sure now. Gold never made that sound. Aradia raises her eyebrows, waiting to see what happens.

“So Isle be dead,” Feferi says. Her voice sounds a little hollow, despite her anger, and you wince internally while carrying on with the important actions of keeping out of the conversation. “What guarantee do I efin have that Isle get there in the first place, Eridan? I’m not saying it’s not useful, I’m saying it’s not important. Not right now.”

Gloomy silence reigns in the lab. You do your best to not drop anything and ruin it, until Eridan does what he does best and ruins it. “Do you think you can win?”

“Nope!” Aradia says, and pops another sourgrub into her mouth. “She can’t,” she says, around the grub. “Not yet, anyway.”

Feferi slinks into sight and sits against the wall perpendicular to Aradia, leaning her head on the leg of your workbench. “It would kelp if I knew what I was going up against. There’s nofin on her weapons, or what strifekinds she uses, and I haven’t been able to find anyfin aboat the existence of other Heiresses she’s gone up against. Maybe there aren’t any.”

Eridan sighs. “If I find somethin’, will you at least go through what I’ve given you already when you ain’t gettin’ bruised by Ray?”

“Oh, think bigger,” Aradia says, and tosses her packet of sourgrubs at you. Since you’re busy, it hits your chest and bounces back onto the workbench, eliciting a yelp that your moirail completely ignores. She hops down from the table and drags Feferi upright. “There’s no reason she can’t spar _and_ learn factoids!”

“Maybe the Empire can stay as it is,” Feferi grumbles, but follows Aradia back upstairs. Eridan sighs and flips open a book, then starts jotting down notes - presumably facts he can throw at Feferi while she tries to dodge Aradia. You figure that’s the end of it, so let yourself breathe and immerse yourself back into cable management.

“Ampora,” Equius says, and you stab yourself under your thumbnail with a corner. Why can these people not just leave well enough alone?

“What?” Eridan says, the absence in his voice indicating that he’s distracted but pretty sure one of his inferiors is talking to him. You’re going to have to headbutt him in the nose soon if he keeps it up, as a preventative measure. Nobody can sound superior when they’re trying to talk through a swollen nose.

Equius takes a deep breath. One day he might get used to addressing his betters, but then again, Equius. “It may be. Less necessary to concentrate on highblood etiquette, at this point in time.”

Eridan looks up with a scowl. “An’ you’d know all about it, would you?”

Equius swallows, and sweats, but holds steady. “The Empire is primarily composed of low and midbloods. You are correct in your summation of the Empire’s highbloods. No matter how much preparation the Heiress completes, she will be regarded as an interloper and pawn, were she to ascend to the throne, no matter their obligations.” He’s clearly been thinking about this since his and Feferi’s last conversation about expectations.

“And?” Eridan snaps, scowl growing deeper. His face is going to get stuck that way, if he’s not careful. “We’re doin’ things to get the support a’ the lowbloods already. That’s the whole reason Sol’s here.”

You spare a moment to gaze at the configuration in your hands beseechingly. Maybe one day they’ll realise that not calling you all lowbloods and treating you as the contact point for all lowbloodlandia would be helpful in advancing their cause.

“I believe that the midbloods are being overlooked,” says Equius, in his typical fashion. It’s not ‘you idiots are overlooking a good third of the population’, no, it could never be Feferi’s or Eridan’s fault. The midbloods are being overlooked; a tragedy with nobody to blame. “The jadebloods, for example, control the Alternian population, while tealbloods control administrative positions in every level of the Empire. My caste and Nepeta’s caste branch out through the military. There is a lot of power, collectively.”

“Huh,” Eridan says, tapping his chin with a pencil. “An’ what about it, then? It ain’t like they got things like psionic service to worry about, there ain’t much we can do to convince ‘em as a whole that Fef’s goin’ to be better as Empress for ‘em.”

Equius turns back to his work. “We tend to be either highly individualistic, like Vriska, or to be facilitators.” He tightens a screw delicately, then pauses to examine his work. “Our roles tend to partnerships and responsibilities, and strong leadership is valued. For those like Vriska, the freedom to choose their path trumps all.”

“Is that what you call it?” you mutter, in a stunning lapse of common sense.

“Huh,” Eridan says again, but more thoughtful. He’s actually _listening_ to Equius. You never thought you’d see the day Eridan listened to anyone who wasn’t as much of an asshole as you or as purple as Feferi. “So if she goes in with half a plan an’ the hauteur to back it up, midbloods aren’t likely to put up much of a fuss?”

“With some concessions, they could be a stable foundation of power.” Equius takes another breath and turns back to his work, deliberately concentrating on it in order to calm down. You watch for a moment, then shrug to yourself. No disaster to avert, everything’s gone well and nobody has had their throat torn out. A successful inter-haemospectrum conversation, indeed.

“Why are you bein’ helpful?” Eridan asks, and you sigh. The problem with revolution is that nobody is capable of leaving well enough alone. If they get into a fight you’re going to haul at least one of them outside and dump them between Feferi and Aradia, then disappear before vengeance can be had. “I would a’ figured you wouldn’t a’ wanted to implicate yourself in our doin’s.”

Equius gestures at the mess of parts in front of him. “It’s rather late for that.” When Eridan doesn’t give up on eyeing him suspiciously, he adds, “Given my involvement, I hope to receive the rewards that those who have helped the Empire would expect to receive, should the Heiress succeed.”

“Well,” Eridan says, mollified by logic he can understand. “You’d have’ta talk to Fef about that.”

You go back to your work with ferocious concentration, now that the two of them might shut up for five minutes.

—

Equius leaves the lab after an hour or so, a stony look of frustration locking his features in place. You’re almost at the same point, but you think your moirail would be less than kindly inclined to you if you interrupted the most fun she’s ever had kicking a Heiress up and down Equius’ hive in order to whine at her. You keep going for as long as you can, but you’ve never had the patience for this sort of finicky cable wrangling. There’s a reason you focus on software, but with a project this big and only the two of you to work on it, little things like ‘preferences’ and ‘sleep’ are starting to get skipped in favour of ‘shit we were meant to complete this a week ago’.

Still, there’s only so much one troll can take. You put down your mess - _gently_ , because the only other option would be to drop-kick it into the wall and you don’t want to have to do it all again - and slump back into your chair, closing your eyes and pressing the heels of your palms into them. Too much focus, not enough food.

“There’s sandwiches,” Eridan says, and you nearly stick yourself to the ceiling before you remember he was there the whole time. “Some kind a’ nut spread,” he adds. “Fuckin’ weird.”

You give Eridan a dubious look, which he thoroughly ignores, then turn your attention to the promised sandwiches. The nut spread _is_ kind of weird, but as soon as you smell something vaguely food-like your stomach makes decisions faster than your brain can, and half of the first one is crammed in your mouth before you realise what’s happened.

Well, you’re reasonably sure Eridan wouldn’t poison you with a sandwich. He’s too impatient for poison.

“Why are you telling me about sandwiches?” you ask around the other half, attempting to stare him down. It also fails to work, which is upsetting given that you’ve got amazing eyes for staring someone down. It’s hard to bear up under the gaze of two colourful expanses of electricity. “Shouldn’t you be annoying FF?”

Eridan groans and leans back in his chair, pressing his hands under his glasses in an echo of what you just did. “Can we not have one conversation that isn’t about how hung up on Fef I am, Captor? It’s always a delight, but I ain’t really up for the same circular arguments at the moment.”

You almost feel sorry for him. _Almost_. You imagine that he feels the same way about your work as you do about his; perhaps useful, a giant timesink, a long shot, and utterly not your division. The only difference is that your research might have something that comes to light after your inevitable messy deaths, while he’s mostly just annoying Feferi into snapping at him.

It’s a fairly big difference, you must admit. At least it gives him something to do.

“Well, what do you want to talk about, then?” you finally ask, inspecting the last sandwich. Result: it’s definitely a sandwich. You take a bite instead of cramming it in your mouth whole and are rewarded with actual flavour.

Eridan blinks at you. Evidently he wasn’t expecting that question. “Uh.”

“You’re kidding,” you grumble. “Quit opening your mouth unless you’ve got a reason to.” He stares at you, turning brilliantly purple out to his fins, and you have to replay your sentence before you groan. “I meant-”

“Yeah, just watch your mouth, Captor,” he says, but it’s half-hearted. To avoid the awkward silence that follows, you take another leisurely bite of your sandwich. Can’t be awkward if you’re busy eating. “You heard about Vris an’ Kar,” Eridan finally says, out of nowhere. To your credit, you don’t choke.

“Yeah,” you say, after very pointedly not choking. A nasty suspicion occurs to you. “Are you in contact with VK?”

Eridan snorts. “I’m the last person Vris wants to talk to. Kar told me. Some orangeblood jumped at him with a knife an’ Vris stopped him, is what I got.”

“TZ just told me it happened,” you allow, grudgingly. It rankles, a little, that he has more details than you. TZ’s your ashmate, and KK’s your best friend. Eridan’s just some interloper who- who had, like, weekly shitty movie nights with Karkat for as long as you can remember, but that doesn’t fucking count.

It counts a little, you admit, even more grudgingly. Fine. At least he has the decency to share the details with you, unlike the assholes halfway across the world.

Eridan leans forward. “So what’s Vris up to?” he asks, and the question chills your bones. Eridan knows Vriska as well as anyone, except maybe Terezi. And Vriska’s been a subject you’ve been dancing around, because of Aradia, because of Terezi, because of everything that’s happened, and Eridan bringing the possibilities out into the open is somewhat like being slapped in the face. “She’s got you doin’ that thing, too.”

You spin your chair so it faces his table properly and lean back in it, considering. “I’m scouting out sources of scrap for spare creds,” you say, “or she wants me to think I am. I don’t think there’s much she could do except collect creds, though.” You chew your lip, thinking back. “I think she wants to be able to buy her way to a place she likes, after Ascension,” you hazard, based on the few conversations you’ve had, and the way she wilts whenever Terezi speaks to her.

Eridan crosses his arms and frowns. “If she’s tryin’ to get away, why is she gettin’ all cozy with ‘Ray an’ helpin’ Kar? She could fuckin’ disappear if she wanted to, it ain’t like we’d be missin’ her.” He eyes you speculatively. “What are you really doin’ for Vris?”

You groan, because so far you’re 100% on people flipping their shit after you tell them what you’re doing. “Checking out old ships for scrapworthiness, okay?”

To your utter surprise, Eridan doesn’t flip his shit. He does raise an eyebrow. “Is she tryin’ to seduce you into Helmin’ an’ runnin’ away with her?”

You groan again, and slide down in your chair. “Sure, because I’m _super_ vulnerable to being seduced by Vriska into Helming old junkers that don’t even have functional helmscolumns. Fuck that question.”

“Well, as long as it’s understood that I got prior claim.” Eridan leans back and puts his feet up on the table. “I ain’t sure what her game is, but so long as we keep an eye on her, we should be fine.”

You stare at him. Then you sputter, “Prior claim? Fuck you!” For once, your adult body feels like it’s working in your favour, since you couldn’t get a good loom going on before you were taller and more solidly-built than Eridan, for all that it’s only going to last until he moults since you’re still a weed, just an advanced weed.

He looks up at you levelly, his fins flared out in annoyance. “Yeah, I got a prior claim. You acknowledged it yourself, Captor, when you were fuckin’ drunk with helms-lust when all this started. If you’re goin’ to be anyone’s ship, you’re goin’ to be mine.”

To your utter embarrassment, you feel a flush rising in your cheeks. “Things are different-” you say, weakly.

“They are,” Eridan acknowledges, not shifting. “For one, you ain’t in such a hurry to fuckin’ drown yourself anymore.”

“Yes!” You grab onto that point before it can escape, so you can avoid going any further into embarrassing personal fucked-up-edness land. “I have shit to do that isn’t getting stuck into a column. Besides,” you add, aiming for snide, “who says I wanted to be your ship?”

Eridan, to your disgust, remains unaffected by your looming and snideness. You should have practiced the looming when you moulted; you’re not used to being taller than most people, and the advantage will go away soon. The snideness comes naturally, of course. Eridan, equally naturally, laughs at it. “Whose would you be, then, Sol? Fef’s? Vris’? Eq’s?”

“You gonna name everyone I’ve ever met?”

“Anyway,” Eridan says, completely ignoring you, “you ain’t the same idiot chasin’ wires, but you can’t blame us for some apprehension what with your current project an’ runnin’ around with Vris an’ all. An’ if you get got by her, it ain’t gonna matter how thoroughly you object to bein’ a Helmsman nowadays.”

You throw your hands up in frustration. “You know what? Fuck you. One, it’s not gonna happen. Two, still don’t belong to you, fuckface.” Whatever Eridan’s getting at with all this bullshit, you’re not biting. You have shit to do, like keeping Aradia out of line of said bullshit by finishing this, and hopefully keeping your own ass alive. You don’t have _time_ for obligations beyond the necessary.

“Don’t you?” Eridan says, and you decide to stop listening to him. The dizzy, empty-headed feel of lack of food has gone away, so you quit your loom, spin your chair back to your work, and pick it all up again. Eridan, undeterred, continues, “You ain’t able to care about someone in the slightest without handin’ them a piece a’ your heart on a platter, Captor. When it comes down to the wire, you’ll offer yourself up like a fuckin’ idiot to spare anyone you know a single hurt feelin’.”

You don’t respond. Because of course you fucking would, that’s the whole point of caring, and why you can’t be fucked most of the time. You’re not like AA, fierce and personable, and you’re not someone to be counted on through thick and thin, like KK is. You’re not even like TZ, with scalpel-blade affection. But when it comes down to it, you’ll do right by the people who need you to. You haven’t even _thought_ about it before.

A chair scrapes against the concrete floor, and then Eridan leans over your shoulders, taking the wires from your hands before you can smack his away. You could snatch them back with psionics, but you’re afraid of melting them. “An’,” Eridan says, braiding the wires through each other as he talks, “that’s what I’m sayin’. Shit goes down - Vris, Fef not winnin’, whatever - an’ you decide to offer yourself up to whoever’s buyin’, you’re goin’ to need someone who ain’t goin’ to walk on eggshells ‘cause you just did some fuckin’ stupid emotional shit that’s got you locked down for the rest of your life to keep you sane. Ain’t nobody else who’ll treat you like fuckin’ idiot Helmsman Captor in our gang.” He drops the wiring, perfectly braided by a smug fuck who knows how to repair nets and now only in need of soldering to various bits and pieces, into your hands, and you have to scrabble at it to keep it from unravelling.

Mostly, when it comes to relationships, you’re an ‘enh’ kind of person. Aradia and Terezi, for all that you do care about them, are forces of habit at this point. You always figured that for Ascension, you’d hook up with other losers who needed to get through the system and awkwardly split up as soon as collection was over, and, well, Eridan _is_ pretty. Shallow, but true. You never expected to have someone make you _seethe_ like this - not because he’s completely misunderstood you, but because he’s fucking nailed it, and if you say anything, he’ll _know_.

“So,” he says, inordinately pleased with himself, and scrapes one of your left horns with his teeth. Fuck, he noticed. You carefully lay down the wiring, because you don’t want to unravel it and the thought of asking Eridan to do it again is laughable. “It ain’t me takin’ you, Captor. You already handed yourself over. If it’s gotta be formalised…” You feel his shrug, same as you feel his breath against your horns, a jolt through your body that verges on unpleasant. “You’re mine. Just makin’ sure you know it.”

“Get off me,” you snarl, and shrug him off. When he goes, you fist a hand in his shirt and drag him into the most awkwardly-positioned, neck-cricking kiss that has ever existed. He laughs breathlessly against your mouth at first, but you use your teeth and press against his lips without discretion, wanting him to bleed more than anything. By the time he catches on, you’ve found that biting his lower lip makes his knees weak no matter how hard you do it, and his blood is cool smeared on your own lips.

“-so like you were saying,” someone says from across the room and out the door. You ignore it, until the words cut off in a squeak that can only belong to Feferi. Even then, it takes her clearing her throat to make you push Eridan away. He stands there like an idiot, and you’re tempted to leave the excuses to him - Equius would take it better anyway - but he’s obviously in no state to.

Feferi is amused, one hand covering her smile and pink tinging her fins near where they attach to her face. Were it the Good Old Days, you imagine she’d be laying into Eridan for hours about this; it’s the first time you’ve ever wished that Eridan and Feferi were still moirails, because that mental image is hilarious. Equius, predictably, is sweating profusely, and from the way his hands have balled into fists, it’s a good thing he didn’t take any of his work with him.

“Finished the thing,” you say, and hold your bundle of wires up as sacrifice to the gods of awkward silences. Eridan squawks in protest, given that he finished the thing, not you, and Aradia comes in with Nepeta just in time to see the resultant slapfight over said bundle of wires. Feferi and Equius ignore it all entirely in relief that the awkwardness has broken, Feferi bouncing over to the two of you while Equius gets one last blanch in as you try to surreptitiously lick Eridan’s blood off your lips so you’re not completely unfit for polite company.

“Equius is going to build me a robot to punch!” Feferi tells the two of you, back to cheerful now that she’s got a path again.

You think you know the feeling.


	20. Chapter 20

Things have been going okay. As okay as things can be going in the countdown to your inevitable exposure as traitors to the Empire, anyway, which is about the best you can ask for. Aradia’s been where you can keep an eye on her, since Gl’bgolyb hasn’t needed feeding, and your work on the detachable helmsrig is going smoothly enough that you can throw yourself into it without getting frustrated, which means in turn that you get to ignore all the impending doom waiting to crash down around you. It’s the best things have been since all this started - so of course it means that something has to ruin it, preferably while set on fire. Some messages from Terezi, timed approximately an hour before you woke up, promises to be that thing.

— gallowsCalibrator [GC] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —  
GC: SOLLUX!!  
GC: 1F MY QU1RK W3R3 NOT 4LR34DY C4PSLOCK3D 1 WOULD B3 C4PSLOCK1NG 4T YOU SO YOU H4D B3ST B3 TH3R3 B3C4US3 1  
GC: 3V3RYTH1NG H4S B33N RU1N3D 4ND 1 DONT  
GC: SOLLUX JUST 4NSW3R YOUR D4MN M3SS4G3S

You stare at Terezi’s messages and wonder if, as a responsible facilitator of the revolution, you can go hide under your desk and come out after Ascension. Probably not.

TA: ii’m here, what’2 up?  
GC: WOW 1 H4V3 N3V3R H4D TO DO TH1S B3FOR3  
TA: do what exactly.  
GC: W3LL  
GC: YOU S33  
GC: SOLLUX 1T 1S 1MP3R4T1V3 TH4T YOU R3M41N C4LM  
TA: for 2ome MY2TERIIOU2 REA2ON ii am gettiing le22 able two 2tay calm, tz!  
GC: Y3S W3LL  
GC: SOLLUX, KANAYA IS  
TA: …  
TA: ii 2wear two fuck iif you’re punkiing me wiith 2ome 2hiit liike ‘iit’2 her wiiggliing day’ ii wiill get iintwo your fuckiing record2 and mark you un2uiitable for anythiing iin legii2laceratiion  
GC: OH MY SW33T M3RC1L3SS FUCK  
GC: F4LS3 4L4RM

You stare at your screen. This sort of behaviour should be pissing you off, you think, but for all that Terezi loves talking circles around people and stabbing them with their own words, this particular variant of haha-got-you is something that you couldn’t associate with her if you tried. She actually sounds rattled, which is alarming, since you can count the number of times Terezi has been rattled enough to let it show on one hand.

TA: tz what the FUCK.

That’s about the best you can do, with absolutely no knowledge of the situation. Of course, Terezi doesn’t see fit to enlighten you. Of _course_. You’ve been getting over to Equius’ at about the same time every evening, but they’re going to have to forgive you for being a bit late tonight. An actual emergency, or at least what sounds like one, will have to take precedence. If Terezi ever decides to tell you what it is.

GC: Heeeeeeeey, Sol!

You’re suddenly a lot more worried.

TA: vk? you know what, forget the usual fuck-you2, ju2t tell me what the fuck ii2 happeniing.  
GC: Well, Terezi’s laptop was already on! It was easier than finding my palmtop, jeeeeeeeez.  
TA: fuckiing hiilariiou2.   
TA: why doe2 tz 2ound liike 2he ju2t got drop-kiicked by her ance2tor and doe2 iit have anythiing two do wiith you?  
TA: and what the fuck happened wiith kn, ii was hopiing at lea2t one of you wa2 two 2en2iible for thii2 2hiit.  
GC: Oh, that. Kanaya died.  
TA: ii  
TA: WHAT  
GC: Chill! She got 8etter.  
TA: you know, my que2tiion remaiin2 the 2ame.  
GC: Ugh, fine. Kanaya and Karkat were arguing, Kanaya tripped because she forgot she got 8igger and her lim8s go further now, she hilariously impaled herself on a curtain rod, and everyone decided to flip their shit! 8etter?  
TA: no, what the FUCK.  
GC: Yeah, that’s what I said! 8ut apparently rain8ow drinkers are a thing, so that happened.  
GC: She’s draining Terezi now, if that’s what you’re worried a8out.  
TA: ii  
TA: ii am worriied about 2o many thiing2 regardiing thii2 2iituatiion  
TA: for once iin your liife, an2wer a que2tiion hone2tly  
TA: are all of you iincrediibly fuckiing drunk  
GC: Terezi’s 8eing drunk. Same thing, right?

You stare at your screen. Vriska _has_ to be fucking with you. The question is how much, and why. Well, Vriska, she could just think that she’s being funny.

TA: ii don’t beliieve a 2iingle word you’re 2ayiing.  
GC: Siiiiiiiigh.  
GC: Not like some dwee8’s opinion of how completely honest I am 8eing matters to me much, 8ut fine! I can prove it!  
GC: Although you’re 8eing really rude in making me >::::(.

Before you can respond to that particular bundle of accusations, the viewport switches on. Vriska leans in and wriggles her fingers at the camera, crooning, “Hiiiiiiii!” before picking up Terezi’s husktop and turning it to point the camera at the room. “Make it quick, Captor, this thing is heavy,” she orders you, her voice near-inaudible out of the microphone’s range.

You lean in to see the picture better, then put it full-screen to help a little more. It doesn’t do much, since the room is dark as shit and Terezi’s husktop camera is as lame as a husktop camera can get, but you don’t need much more than the big picture to see something’s gone wrong. True to Vriska’s laughable story, one of the curtains is torn down, and it appears to have knocked down everything in its sweeping path and then some. Karkat is half-offscreen, glowering at the room with sopor slime in his hair. Kanaya is front and centre, back turned to Karkat and Terezi draped semi-consciously over her - but not enough to hide the way a borrowed shirt from Karkat is sticking alarmingly to her torso. Worse, every piece of her exposed skin is glowing. Not harshly enough to make the room more than gloomy, but you’re pretty sure schoolfeeding covered glowing and the lack thereof in the troll population.

Shit. Vriska may be fucking with you by not fucking with you. She would.

“What _happened_?” you ask the room, bewildered.

Kanaya starts and looks at the husktop, accidentally sharing a glower with Karkat before breaking eye contact and looking back down at Terezi. “Something rather stupid,” she says, and wipes her mouth with the back of her hand. “Hello, Sollux.”

“Hi,” you say, bewilderment doing nothing but rising. “KN, is this really the time for polite greetings, _what the fuck_.”

Kanaya sighs visibly, even through the shitty husktop camera, before gently dislodging Terezi, who curls up in languor you would never have expected to see on a Pyrope. Relieved of her burden, she holds out her hands towards Vriska, until everyone’s favourite spiderbitch hands over the husktop. Up close, the glow of her skin blows out the camera, making her look sallow. “There’s no point in making a fuss,” she says, adjusting the husktop lid until the camera’s angled less awkwardly. Vriska comes around behind her and leans on her shoulder, utterly unable to give anyone a smidgen of privacy. “I’m fine.”

“You don’t look fine,” you protest. With the camera steady, you can see the tear in her shirt, green seeping through the grey of Karkat’s symbol. You can’t see what’s behind the tear, and all at once you realise that you don’t particularly _want_ to, if Vriska was telling anything approaching the truth. Plus, yeah, the fact that she’s glowing is also slightly disconcerting.

“Things got out of hand,” Kanaya demurs. She won’t even meet your eyes - well, look at the camera, same thing - as she says it, and in the background Karkat develops a problem that means he stops glowering and instead looks faintly sick. “I’m fine. We’re all fine.”

“Glowing!” you say, because you cannot express how disturbing and not-okay the glowing happens to be.

“Ah, well.” Kanaya holds up her hands and looks at them. “The rumours of rainbow drinkers happen to be true. At least I’m-” she cuts off abruptly, and drops her hands, looking almost as sick as Karkat does. “It was an accident,” she says firmly, like she’s said it a thousand times to try to cement in her head. “I don’t blame anyone.”

“Alive,” you say, faintly. “At least you’re still alive.”

Bitterness twists her expression, before she locks a smile on her face. Nobody notices, except you. “Exactly.”

“KN,” you offer, hesitantly, “maybe you guys should give it up and head back.”

Vriska stands up, stretches, and wanders away, bored by the conversation since you’re not spilling every secret you have, you guess. Kanaya’s smile stays in a rictus, which makes it impossible to tell  what she actually wants. After just enough time has lapsed to make her words utterly unconvincing, she says, “No. Karkat- We. We are expected to do certain things, before Ascension, and we’re all needed. This is important work. And it would be ridiculous to travel now, when Terezi and Vriska are going to moult soon.”

You groan. “Maybe you should leave before-” the words ‘you murder them’ dry up in your mouth, and it’s your turn to look sick. Kanaya _died._ The fact everyone is dancing around is that Kanaya _died_ , and now she’s sitting in front of you like some kind of robot, parroting rote answers while you ask her how she is. She’s not _fine_ , fuck, she’s found out the hard way she’s a damn rainbow drinker and you can’t do anything except helplessly ask what happened. “KN, just. Take it easy, yeah?”

“Of course,” she says, lying through her alarmingly fang-like teeth. “I’d best go. Enjoy your night, Sollux.”

You blink at your computer. “Yeah, you-” The video call ends, cutting you off. “-Too,” you finish lamely. There’s nothing you can do to make their situation better. You’re too far away, and you don’t even know where exactly they are. And, if nothing else, you just proved exactly how terrible you are at being the shoulder leaned upon.

The situation’s going to explode somehow, between Vriska and - and this, and there’s nothing you can do. It’s not a good feeling.

—

You expect everyone to need to go through the same what-the-fuck dance you did when you get to Equius’ hive, since you’re inevitably going to be interrogated as to why you’re late and the whole situation is extremely what-the-fuck-worthy, but when you get there, the mood is so viciously somber that even you notice. Even Nepeta and Feferi, normally the most irrepressible of the lot of you, are silent, prodding disinterestedly at what must be the remains of breakfast.

Asking ‘who died?’ is absolutely in poor taste, considering the circumstances, so you flop into your usual chair and ask Aradia, who is busy scrolling through her palmtop with her eyebrows drawn together, “What’s up?”

“Drones,” she says, terse and distracted. “Out west.”

You hiss through your teeth. “Already? It’s way too fucking early, Terezi hasn’t even moulted yet.”

“My fault, probably,” Feferi says, and stabs at the remains of an egg without looking at anyone. “They want to get collection done early, in case somefin happens, I guess.”

You lean back in your chair. This news should be enough to send you into the same tailspin it’s sent everyone else into, but after your conversation with Kanaya, apparently you’ve used up your bad news quota and your reserve of fucks to give is running too low to allocate more fucks to this sector. So it falls to you to be the one who moves past the fact that the drones are starting collections, for all that you’re usually the Everything is Ruined Forever guy. “Well, we have shit to do before they show up,” you say, and follow up by opening the latest firmware you need to test. Today is going to be a day for coding until your eyes bleed.

Aradia squeezes your shoulder, then hops off your desk. “Yeah. Come on, Feferi.” Without waiting, she heads upstairs; Feferi pushes her plate away and follows, for all that her face is still the picture of guilt and misery. Nepeta hesitates a moment, then follows the both of them, fluttering her fingers in a wave to Equius, and presumably you and Eridan.

Eridan leans forward until his forehead rests on the table. “We’ve been tryin’ to get Fef up to survivin’ battle so hard we forgot about survivin’ the fuckin’ _drones_ ,” he moans, in words you can barely make out since he’s trying to talk to a table instead of to either you or Equius.

“Quit whining,” you say, because Equius would never dare to contradict Eridan and it’s pretty much your job description. Ignoring the both of them, you bury yourself in old code, which is the worst kind of code, only just remembering to add in, “You’re the only one here with matesprit and kismesis, fuckface.”

Wow. That is an incredibly depressing realisation. It’s a good thing you’re ignoring it.

Eridan ignores you in turn and continues to talk about the drones, despite your immense efforts to divert the conversation. “How long, d’you think?”

You give up on the room entirely. If Eridan wants to talk about yet another source of imminent death, he can coax Equius into conversation. You’re too busy with preventing the other imminent sources of death to get sidetracked into speculation on when the drones are going to sweep through the land and puree you all.  Plus, all you got was ‘out west’. They could be just outside Equius’ hive, for all you know.

“Eq?” Eridan prompts, giving you up as a lost cause.

“I wouldn’t know,” Equius says, after a panic-filled pause.  Eager to be useful, he adds, “I would assume a time could be estimated if we had solid data on their arrival and their progress thus far. Everything appears to be rumour at the moment, however.”

“Ain’t fuckin’ given us any warning,” Eridan grumbles, settling into his cape and turning his attention from the two of you to his ridiculously pretty-but-useless husktop. “My matesprit’s on the other side a’ the fuckin’ planet.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” you snap, unable to take it. “You get a fucking week from notice to collection, shut up and make yourself useful instead of getting pissy about a mild inconvenience.”

“Look who’s talkin’,” Eridan jeers, but shuts up and makes himself useful. Across the room, Equius relaxes from the effort of neutrally participating in a stressful conversation. Good.

You’re all going to need to make the best use of the time you have, at this point.

—

Trollian bloops at you, snapping you out of your if-else parentheses reverie and dragging you reluctantly back to the real world. You used to hate having Trollian on, but Aradia makes you keep it open, just in case you go too long without eating or sleeping, and now you automatically open it as soon as you boot up any computer you use. It does come in handy, you have to admit.

\-- carcinoGeneticist has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —  
CG: SO, UH.  
TA: ii2 2omeone fiinally goiing two tell me what happened?  
TA: 2omeone explaiiniing a 2iituatiion wiithout vaguely wanderiing around iit! Ii never thought thii2 could happen to 2omeone liike me.  
TA: 2woon.  
CG: ALAS AND ALACK, CAPTOR, YOU ARE SADLY THE JILTED RUNNER-UP AND DON’T GET TO MARRY THE COMPILER YOU’VE BEEN COMPETING OVER ALL SEASON. HERE IS YOUR SECOND-PLACE FAKE FLORAL ARRANGEMENT, THE COMPILER ASSURES YOU THAT YOU’RE STILL A GREAT PERSON AND WISHES YOU THE BEST, AND I FLIP YOU OFF FROM THE AUDIENCE.  
CG: THEN, INSTEAD OF DEEPLY ANALYSING EVERYTHING YOU DID WRONG, AS IS A FAVOURITE PASTIME OF MINE, I GENTLY POINT OUT THAT EVERYTHING IS FUCKING HAPPENING SO MUCH AND NOW I CAN’T EXACTLY TALK TO KANAYA ABOUT WHAT TO DO NEXT!  
CG: OH HEY, SORRY ABOUT THE DEATH-BY-YOU-BEING-WRONG-IN-AN-ARGUMENT, BUT THE DRONES HAVE SHOWN UP AND WE NEED AN ACTION PLAN ON HOW TO DEAL WITH THAT!   
TA: ju2t 2ay that, iit’ll go fiine.  
CG: FUCK YOU WITH EVERY SINGLE VESTIGIAL EVOLUTIONARY APPENDAGE A DRONE POSSESSES.  
TA: look, kk, ii have the 2liimme2t fuckiing clue a2 two what happened, except kn ii2 apparently a raiinbow driinker 2o that work2 out ii gue22.  
TA: you’re eiither goiing two have two 2uck iit up and grovel at her feet, whiich doe2n’t 2ound unde2erved 2iince apparently 2he liiterally fuckiing diied iin what ii am really hopiing wa2 a horriible acciident that wiill never be repeated, or you’re goiing two have two 2uck iit up and make a plan your2elf.  
TA: maybe run iit by tz, don’t tell her ii 2aiid 2o but 2he’2 pretty 2mart.  
CG: NONE OF THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN.  
TA: wow, really?  
CG: I DON’T KNOW WHAT HAPPENED! WE’VE ALWAYS BEEN FRIENDLY, IF NOT FRIENDS. WE DON’T ARGUE AND GET IMPALED ON CURTAIN RODS!  
TA: you have got to be fuckiing kiiddiing me. there ii2 no way that actually happened.  
TA: iif you’re 2upportiing vk’2 liie2 two fuckiing get one over on me ii am goiing two end you.  
CG: IT ACTUALLY FUCKING HAPPENED.  
CG: AS DID EVERYTHING ELSE ON THIS RECRUITMENT DRIVE, WHICH I CAN CONFIRM AS I HAVE ASKED TEREZI TO SOCK ME IN THE ARM SEVERAL TIMES TO MAKE SURE I’M NOT ACTUALLY HAVING A NIGHTMARE. IT SEEMS MORE PLAUSIBLE AT THIS POINT!  
TA: ok kk, ii do not have tiime two be wiitty 2upportiive friiend riight now, thii2 helm2riig i2 compliicated bull2hiit.  
TA: 2o here:  
TA: even ii can tell kn ii2 pii22ed off about actually liiterally dyiing, 2o maybe fuckiing lay off for a whiile and let her 2ort that out 2o you don’t get decapiitated two even the 2core. hell, make iit raiin and throw iin an apology. make your wiilde2t, mo2t abject dream2 come true.  
TA: whiile you’re doiing that, 2uck iit up and do your 2hiit, becau2e iif you don’t everythiing ii2 goiing two fall apart.  
CG: OKAY. OKAY, I CAN DO THAT.  
CG: ALSO, I’M FIRING WITTY SUPPORTIVE FRIEND, AS HE IS COMPLETELY USELESS. LET ME KNOW IF PANICKED ASSHOLE FRIEND IS INTERESTED IN A POSITION WITH TEAM WE’RE-FUCKED.  
TA: catchy name, but he’2 bu2y wiith team dyiing iin glory.  
TA: 2o what are you goiing two do about the drone2? there’2 not much you can do about them, they’re giiant death robot2.  
CG: THIS COLLECTION SEEMS KIND OF ATYPICAL, YOU NOTICED? SO I GUESS WE’RE GOING TO HAVE TO START LOOPING BACK SOON, AND WE’LL BE TRYING TO WARN AS MANY PEOPLE ON THE WAY AS WE CAN. I’M NOT SURE WHAT ELSE WE CAN DO, UNLESS I WANT TO START UP THE KARKAT VANTAS DATING SERVICE FOR UTTER LOSERS.  
TA: you’re not ju2t the founder, you’re al2o a member!  
CG: EXCUSE YOU, I HAVEN’T REACHED *UTTER* LOSER STATUS YET. I’M HOVERING SOMEWHERE AROUND MODERATE LOSER. LOSER WITH A CHANCE OF RAIN.  
CG: WE’LL BE MOVING FAST, ONCE WE START, ANYWAY. MAYBE WE CAN TRACK THE DRONE PROGRESSION, BUY A LITTLE MORE TIME FOR SOME PEOPLE.  
CG: I CAN’T BELIEVE THEY DIDN’T ISSUE THE FUCKING ANNOUNCEMENT AND MOVED THE TIMEFRAME UP.   
CG: A LOT OF OUR COHORT IS GOING TO DIE.  
TA: yeah, well.  
TA: that’2 probably the goal. make 2ure ff ha2 no alliie2, and that everyone’2 pi22ed at her iin2tead of at the conde2ce.  
TA: ju2t do what you can, kk.  
TA: and giive kn 2ome tiime to work thiing2 out. you know how 2he cover2 up 2hiit.  
CG: I AM LEGITIMATELY TAKING PERSONAL ADVICE FROM SOLLUX CAPTOR. I HAVE FOUND A NEW LOW TO SINK TO, AND IT IS DEPRESSINGLY SENSIBLE-SOUNDING.  
TA: yeah ii get that a lot.  
TA: ii gotta get back two work, kk. good luck.  
— twinArmageddons [TA] has ceased trolling carcinoGeneticist [CG] —

You lean back and rub your eyes, pressing your fingers underneath your glasses. This is too much to process in one day; you can’t even imagine how Kanaya is feeling, although the bitter smile you caught on her face gives you a good hint. You can’t be there to knock everyone’s heads together and tell them to get the fuck along already, and at this point you doubt it’d be welcome, but you still hope that Karkat and Kanaya have the wherewithal to put whatever happened behind them and get back to attempting to secure the cohort’s loyalty. It sounds cold, but you need them to. You _all_ need them to.

In retrospect, a plan with as many failure points and crossed fingers as this one should have been thrown out the moment any of you first dreamed it up. What’s the slavery of a good solid percentage of your race to not getting executed brutally for treason? Still pretty shitty, but at least you’d know for certain what was coming.

While you’re distracted, you might as well take the opportunity to be _incredibly_ distracted. It’s not going to make much of a difference, at this point. Eridan appears to have wandered off, leaving a pile of scarf, glasses, and cape behind, but your compadre in exciting incremental helming developments is still with you. It is his basement, but you think you might be spending as much time down here as he does, nowadays. Maybe more. You wander over and look at his screen over his shoulder, since spending as much time in this basement as you have is as good an excuse as any to pretend boundaries don’t exist. Cerulean text and way too many exclamation marks fill up his Trollian window.

“Vriska?” you ask, in your most dubious tone of voice.

Equius jumps, almost knocking your chin. You step back just in time to avoid the need for having your jaw wired shut for the foreseeable future, which would be a minor inconvenience and a major annoyance, since Aradia is magnetically drawn to playing with any complicated-looking contraption she seems. Incidentally, this is also the reason you stopped going exploring with her when you were six.

“We were discussing her prosthetic arm,” Equius says once he’s recovered from the shock, lacking the usual frostiness he gets whenever you do something Inappropriate, like eavesdropping on your betters. He minimises the window, before adding, “It will be a more complex restoration than I had expected. I can test some of the principals we have developed.”

“Cool,” you say, and then flounder for some excuse to not go back to hurting your eyes over misplaced parentheses.”Will she make it back in time? KK said they were going to take some time looping back.”

By now, the two of you should really be used to conversing. Instead, you’re stuck making awkward, polite conversation that belongs to the Regency era - why Zahhak, I do declare, it is commonly known that even on dragonback, it takes time to circumnavigate the globe! This is what happens when you make an effort.

Nonetheless, Equius’ highblood manners keep you trapped in excruciating small talk. “I believe she will detach from the party and fly ahead, if it becomes necessary,” he informs you. “The base of her arm is similar to Tavros’ leg, however. The sensory implant band that the limb attaches to is designed to adjust or break into parts in order to avoid injuring the-” he fumbles, “-the site further. She may lose the use of her arm until it can be upgraded.”

“Cool,” you say again, for lack of anything else. “What’re you gonna be testing out in the new arm?”

Equius seizes the topic like a lifeline, dragging conversation back to familiar and less volatile grounds. Not like you’re planning to hide down here and kill Vriska while she’s getting her arm fitted, but Equius realises, more than anyone thanks to having both sides of this argument on his makeshift operating table, that the less you talk about her, the better. “I designed her last arm several sweeps ago, so there are several structural improvements I wish to implement,” he says, sketching with his hands in the air. “The firmware you’ve written is superior to my own attempts, but I will have to make several radical changes to the exoskeleton in order to connect everything appropriately-”

Vriska’s arm running your code is an amusing thought. You wonder if you can program in some routines to smack her in the face at around six in the evening every few nights. Beyond that, her arm is a challenge you can’t resist. You’ve been itching to try shoving everything you and Equius have made together to do more than test signal goes through when you want it to, and this is a perfect opportunity, even if it is attached to someone you’d gladly punch in the face. “Hold up,” you tell Equius, and jog back to your workbench to scoop up your abandoned markers. With them in hand, you jog back and slap them down in front of him, rolling up your sleeve before you can lose the momentum of actually wanting to work on something. “So where’s her arm end? Here?” you ask, pointing at your narrow excuse for a bicep.

“Higher,” Equius says, a frown appearing on his face. “Captor-”

“Here.” You press the markers into his hands. “It’ll be easier if you do it, and you need to figure out how everything’s going to work in 3D. I’m not gonna be much use for the rest of the day, anyway, it’s giving me a headache. Might as well work on something useful.”

Equius sighs, but draws a precise band around your arm.  He barely touches you as he turns your arm to get a better angle, with the long practice of someone used to not being able to touch things without breaking them. “I had the ulnar and median transmitters placed here, but having the wire bundles pass through the elbow hampers mobility, and the wires may deteriorate over time.” From the band around your arm - your shoulder, really - he draws a Y-shape that drags down the inside of your elbow and splits further through your hand, into your fingers. “If they are merged here and split further down, both transmitters should still retain functionality whilst ensuring longevity. The hinges and plating will wrap it like so,” he says, switching colours and drawing the framework of an arm, struts and hinges, over the nerves. He doesn’t misplace a single line, which makes you wonder how often he’s drawn out the blueprints.

“I get this,” you say, pointing to the part where ulnar and median merge, “but through the hand? Doesn’t seem that innovative.”

“My former attempt was crude,” Equius says, sudden quiet loathing in his voice. You’re taken aback, until you realise it’s directed at himself. “The improvements you have made will allow greater sensitivity with less materials.” You make a noise in acknowledgement, not wanting to incite more of the self-loathing even if you really want to see his old blueprints.  “In any case,” he continues, tone still a little dark, “I was thinking of combining the necessary microcontrollers into a processing bank and installing it here.”

You make a face. “How shock-absorbent’s the plating?” It _would_ be fun to laugh at Vriska if she punched a wall and found her arm stuck in a loop of misbehaviour, but now your rarely-seen craftsmanship urge is kicking in. Between you and Equius, Vriska’s arm is still going to be fine long after her bones have turned to dust. You grab the red pen and begin breaking the nerve wiring down. “Keep them in-line with the wires instead of diverting them off and sticking them somewhere, then wrap them in something to cushion them against being flung around. Less likely to break under stress.”

“Captor-”

Something’s still wrong. You tap the pen against your teeth, considering. “What about all the hydraulics you use?”

“The pump and reservoir are located in the upper arm,” he says. “ _Captor_ -”

“Waterproofing, then,” you say. “I mean, internally, I know you make the limb submersible-”

“Captor!” Equius breaks through your musings with an uncharacteristic snap. You weren’t aware he was capable of being sharp. Unfortunately, his capability disappears when you stare at him like an antlerbeast in a spotlight, waiting to see what inspired it. “I-” he eventually says, when he realises that you’re waiting on him, “I am- uncomfortable, with this.” He lays the marker he’s holding down on the table.

“With…?” You stare at him, then at your arm. It’s _ink_. Not a big deal. “ _Why_?”

He takes a deep breath, although it doesn’t help his halting words. “I have come to respect you in the time we have been working together.” As your brows start drawing together in even more puzzlement, he stumbles through the rest of his reasoning. “You have exhibited a tendency towards idealising helmsmanship throughout this time, and I am. Not comfortable, enstabling your behayviour.”

“I’m not-” you protest. Shit, he must actually be worried, you don’t think he even _noticed_ the horse puns creeping in. “EQ, I don’t even-” You’re used to tripping over your own tongue, but not like this. Scanning back through your interactions with him is depressing; you don’t think _you_ _’d_ believe that you’re over the Helming compulsion if you weren’t in your own brain. “I’ll stop,” you finally say. The tingling that sweeps out to your ears and down your neck indicates that you find this subject at least as mortifying as he does.

Equius nods jerkily, at least as blue as you are yellow and sweating on top of it. By mutual unspoken agreement that that is quite enough awkward conversation for now, you go back to your workbench and he sorts through a drawer full of screws. For all that you don’t particularly want to be a Helmsman anymore, the lack of needing to interact with people is a perk that you should have perhaps thought more about.


	21. Chapter 21

— arachnidsGrip [AG] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —   
AG: Sooooooool.  
AG: We had a 8argain.  
TA: you’ve got to be fuckiing kiiddiing me.   
TA: kn ju2t DIIED and you’re 2hakiing me down. don’t you have better thiing2 two be doiing?  
AG: What 8etter time? You still owe me! And soon you’re going to 8e too 8usy to deliver.  
AG: I’m just making sure that you can keep your part of the deal.  
TA: ii’m so grateful.  
AG: That’s gr8! I’m glad we’ve esta8lished a good working rel8ionship.   
AG: Now go look 8t my ship!  
— arachnidsGrip [AG] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —   
TA: truly you are a ma2ter of maniipulatiion.

You go to Equius’ place like usual, since it’s probably quicker than trying to catch everyone on Trollian and tell them you’re taking off for a couple nights. AA never answers if she’s distracted, ED’s probably being distracted, you have no idea how you even got Feferi’s trollhandle in the first place, and you’re hesitant to poke Equius after the whole Helmsmanning blowup.

Aurthour lets you in when you get there, and when you head down to the basement, it becomes obvious that you’re the first one there thanks to wanting this whole excursion to be over already. Equius and Nepeta are down there, which you find out when Nepeta runs into your ribcage when you open the door, but all she does is wink and squeeze past you when you attempt to not trip over all four feet in a space designed for two, maybe three feet. Three pupa feet at that; this whole adult moult thing is getting old.

The wink is worrying. The wink implies some sort of conspiracy, and you’re already in too many conspiracies. You’re also pretty sure that you’d rather be in a conspiracy to overthrow the Empress than whatever conspiracy Nepeta’s cooking up.

“Captor,” Equius says in greeting, already elbow-deep in his work. “You are earlier than normal.”

“I’m not staying,” you say, awkwardly shoving your hands in your pockets. You hadn’t expected to have to hang around and make small talk before leaving. You’re too big a fan of the fucking-right-off method of farewell, and only really got used to telling AA where you were going so that she could make the appropriate surprised noises and avenge your death if you got jumped somewhere. “Gotta go do the thing for Vriska,” you add, to get the worst of the awkwardness over with.

True to your suppositions, a chilled silence pools through the room.

“She didn’t give me much warning,” you add, in as much of an apology as you’re going to give. Luckily, Equius has enough self-control to not destroy the framework he’s working on, but he’s still got his mouth drawn out in a snooty flat line of disapproval, which would usually have your hackles up. This time, you want a lab to come back to, so you say, “I thought you’d be working on her arm anyway, so…”

“Ah,” Equius says, his shoulders relaxing fractionally. You have been spending too much time in proximity with other trolls if you can actually get a handle on body language beyond the obvious. “Yes,” he says, then adds, “however, I am concerned about the progress of the - the neural processing unit. For the helm.”

You shrug. “If you figure out how to get Serket to quit riding my ass, let me know.”

“I-” Equius stammers out, coming down with the vapours. Literally, you can practically see him steaming. “It would be improper of me to interfere in any arrangements you might have.”

His phrasing, even more careful and precise than it usually is, makes you pause. Finally, cautiously, you ask, “Was that a fucking joke from you, EQ?” Sadly, you think it was; you can practically see him checking off a Defuse Situation Politely With Humour box on a checklist of Ways to Not Get In Fights With the Uppity Lowbloods. To be entirely fair to the cause of Uppity Lowbloods, Vriska Serket is a situation that requires defusing in and of herself.

He’s saved from having to explain his developing sense of humour - and really, a miracle like that would be hard to explain - by Aradia, Feferi, and Eridan arriving in a knot. A loud, argumentative knot, which at least means that your departure won’t be the only aggravating thing happening in the region of Equius’ hive tonight.

Things are still a little awkward between you and AA since the disastrous FLARP night, and bringing up Vriska is likely only going to make it worse, but you have to tell her you’re going. She surprises you by hugging you in front of Eridan, Feferi, and Equius, but you relax into the hug like you always have, your nose buried in her mass of hair, her horns brushing your shoulders. “I hate Vriska,” she tells you, and even that isn’t enough to ruin anything about the moment. “I pity you more. Come back safe.”

“You stay safe,” you mutter, but squeeze her shoulders before letting her go to be your usual apathetic self again. This is why you usually fuck right off, before anyone can get emotional. You’re only going to be gone three nights, tops.

Eridan follows you out, because he lives to annoy you. “So, about Vris,” he says, once the two of you are out of earshot of the rest of your gang of traitors.

“Pretty fucking tired of hearing about Vriska’s plans to helm me,” you tell him, shouldering through the front door.

He snorts. “Whatever, Sol, we sorted that. What I was goin’ to say is that you should take the opportunity to figure out her fuckin’ plan already, ‘cause you ain’t alone in your paranoia.”

“I see why FF made you her advisor,” you sneer, and leap into the air before he can retaliate.

—

This particular carcass of a ship is, predictably, right on the intersection of ‘fucking’ and ‘nowhere’, a close neighbour to ‘absolute fuck-all’. You have to shelter in a cave for the first day, after kicking out a particularly cranky cholerbeast, but the lichen is downright hively and the rocks at least seem to be spider-free. You crawl over to what looks like the most comfortable one, shove some food in your mouth to replace the calories you burned, slap a sopor patch on your arm, and pass out so thoroughly that the cholerbeast could probably dice you and you wouldn’t notice. You reach the ship the second night, just as dawn is hitting the horizon, and dive into what’s left of its bones glad to not be fried to death.

It’s cool and gloomy inside, but in better repair than the first one. Less rust, less dents and scratches in the interior walls. Like new, excepting it’s probably a good three hundred sweeps old at minimum, so it must have been barely-used when it crashed.

You’re having trouble figuring out where these ships come from. All the data terminals are so obsolete it’d take equipment you don’t have - that nobody has - to access the black box, or you’d satisfy your curiosity. Even with the ungrateful-psionic-crashes-ship-after-romantic-mishap trope you started nixing on movie nights with Karkat being a thing that everyone believes in, the data you do have doesn’t back it up. Helmsman conditioning is layered, and it breaks its recipients pretty thoroughly. Someone could hold onto their identity, maybe, twisted into a form that benefits the Empire, which was about the best you were hoping for pre-everything, but actually endangering the ship, and its crew? Impossible. If a ship gets destroyed, it’s usually in space when things can fuck up as catastrophically as possible. A hull breach, shittily-maintained equipment, someone with a grudge, even mutiny-gone-wrong. It’s not usually - not ever on planet. Ships malfunction more than most of the population knows, but they don’t do it like this.

Vriska’s found at least three. And while you wouldn’t put it past her to do it somehow, she didn’t sink them; these are way too old. This one might’ve had an impact crater at some point, but the terrain’s had plenty of time to change. You wish you could tell what happened. It’d give you more insight into whatever Vriska’s planning, maybe, and if not you’d still know.

Fuck. You’re going to be having day terrors about every single possibility your brain can wring out of your entirely too vivid imagination. No point in trying to get some sleep, even if it is past dawn now. Instead, you pull out your palmtop and message Vriska, who is online but idle.

— twinArmageddons [TA] started trolling arachnidsGrip [AG] —   
TA: 2o what am ii 2uppo2ed two be lookiing for iin thii2 2hiitheap?

She doesn’t message you back straight away, so you start drifting through the hallways of the ship. It’s small as far as ships go, which still mean it’s fucking huge, about seven hundred metres long and a hundred-fifty at its tallest point. You start there and find the bridge, terminals all smashed to pieces and glass over the floor. It’s a good thing you can fly.

A quick search of the bridge doesn’t yield much in way of assuaging your curiosity. All the terminals have been dead longer than you’ve been alive, and anything organic like paper would have crumbled a long time ago, even if it is relatively dry out here. There’s a gash in the hull as tall as two of you throwing sunlight across the half of the room you’re not in. It must have happened when the ship hit land, tearing itself apart with its own force.

Animals have been in here and made off with all the remains of the crew, over the hundreds of sweeps this ship has been sitting here. At least you’re not going to be stepping on any toes.

AG: Oh, you fiiiiiiiinally made it?  
AG: What condition is the ship in?

You sigh and start drifting through the ship again, your eyes bouncing light off the walls and spooking you a little when they reflect at an angle you don’t expect. Despite the hull breach, the rest of the ship is in good condition, the only impassable corridor leading towards the fore. In rear-propulsion ships designed like this, the narrow nose of the ship was usually just storage, anyway. When you don’t answer within the five - no, eight probably - seconds Vriska allots you, your palmtop buzzes.

AG: Hello? Alternia to Sol!  
AG: Ugh, don’t tell me something 8 you. I just got everyone to stop 8eing pissed at me.  
TA: calm your tiit2, fuck. ii’m lookiing.  
TA: the hull ii2 kiind of riipped up iin place2, the cha22ii2 ii2 bent two hell and back but 2eem2 iintact.  
TA: how diid you even know thii2 wa2 here?  
AG: 8y putting some irons to some fires :::;)  
AG: The wiring?  
TA: ugh. giive me a moment.

You shove your palmtop back into your pocket and look for the nearest patch of sunlight. It’s not too large, which is good, since you can cautiously scoot around it and get into a position to look at the wall cavity of the main hull where it’s torn apart. Nothing’s there, so you carefully hook your psionics around the edge and peel the inner panel away from the hull, exposing a long strip of the cavity. You probably could have managed to get in there - maintenance workers would have to, and it’s not like you have any meat to spare on your bones that’d present a difficulty - but this is much less claustrophobic. Too bad if Vriska didn’t want her ship ripped further apart.

Bundles of cables as thick as your arm are strewn haphazardly inside, falling off and fraying at the hull breach, snapped elsewhere, worked loose of their channels in other places. One dusty-tyrian bundle is neater than the others, clipped into a row of hooks near your feet. You nudge it with your toe, grimace at the brighter patch of tyrian your ill-considered action leaves behind, then pull out your palmtop again.

TA: iit’2 all iin piiece2, but iit’2 here.  
AG: Ugh, gr8. That’s going to 8e a pain in the ass to strip and melt down.   
AG: So what’s there?  
TA: fuck iif ii know, ii’m not a metallurgii2t. you want expertii2e, you 2hould have twii2ted eq’2 arm iin2tead of miine.  
TA: there are both grey AND orange wiire2. iit’2 amaziing.  
TA: al2o 2ome biiowiire that ha2n’t completely dii2iintegrated.  
AG: Reeeeeeeeally?   
TA: could you be any more obviiou2 about tryiing two wiind me up over helmiing.  
AG: Aw, I thought you were into it. 8ring some 8ack and I can giftwrap you for Eridan after I get my arm fixed!   
AG: He’s always wanted to take a psionic for a cruise.  
TA: ok well ii’m lookiing around 2ome more, back when you 2top beiing a biitch over helmiing.  
— twinArmageddons [TA] has ceased trolling arachnidsGrip [AG] —

It takes about fifteen minutes for you to make your way down into the pit of the aft, dodging sunbeams and fallen support girders the whole way. The engineblock is still mostly intact, thick fuchsia coils looping in the corners and running into the walls, then out through to the propulsion system.

There’s another card-locked door at the back. You slice through it, like you did the last one, and pull it out of its frame with psionics.

The wires aren’t in great condition. They still exist, sure, they haven’t crumbled to dust, but age is stamped all over them. Their insulation has lost their lustre, the fuchsia isn’t as eye-searing as Feferi’s, and they sag out of their routes, stretched out by hundreds of sweeps of gravity. You find a jack and pick it up to test it, only to have the metal fall off and leave a bare wire. You peer down, inside the oddly fleshy insulation, then send a bolt of psionic power through it.

Nothing happens. This would be a much more useful exercise if you had some sort of visible output to hook the wires up to.

Five minutes of floating, destroying a frosted strip in the roof, and digging the one surviving light out from under it gives you your output, and some biowire harvested from outside the helmsblock, where you figure it’s less likely to be missed, gives you your test subject. You strip a little of the insulation from the middle - fuck that’s gross - shrug fatalistically at alignments, and shunt power into your pathetic excuse for a circuit.

Your miraculously-salvaged lightbulb lives on.

Okay, well. You let the circuit go as you rock back on your heels to think. The light stays on for a few moments before sputtering out, leaving you the sole source of illumination in the room. This - the main body of the biowire - has been pretty sheltered. No sun, no wind, no animals chewing on it thanks to the doors to the engineblock and helmsblock still standing. The wires are probably still all functional, if delicate, and you do not want to let Vriska get her hands on them. She wouldn’t know what to do with them, but there’s no telling what kind of brilliant, desperate idiots she might have in her web. She got you here, after all.

You pick up an end of biowire and start looping it from elbow to palm, creating a loose coil. It manages to hold up under your handling, which gives you hope that it’ll survive whatever battery of experiments you and Equius dream up. Once you’ve gotten enough for the coil to get unwieldy, you cut it off from the ship and captchalogue it.

— arachnidsGrip [AG] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —   
AG: Just tell me how the rest of the ship is, dum8ass.  
TA: iit’2 pretty griim. the biiowiire down2taiir2 ii2 fucked, look2 liike there wa2 a fiire.   
TA: there’2 a biit up2taiir2, but mo2t of iit got expo2ed two the weather.  
AG: Fuck! 8iological shit sells faster than I can put it up for gra8s.  
TA: the metal’2 fine, anyway. kiinda 2corched, but fiine underneath.  
AG: At least this wasn’t a complete w8ste of time, then.  
AG: Don’t fuck up my ship.  
— arachnidsGrip [AG] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —

Wow. Yeah, Vriska’s tantrum over not being able to sell biowires is totally plausible, and you have a bridge out by Kanaya’s hive to sell. You tuck your palmtop away and look around the room, before calling up your psionics. In a way, it’s a shame to destroy the last remnant of life on the ship, but you’re not letting Vriska get her hands on this technology.

—

It takes less time than you expect to go through the ship, burning out every piece of biowire that you find. You still haven’t slept, though, which means by the time you’re done, it’s mid-afternoon and you collapse in a corner of the bridge, too tired to fumble out a sopor patch and go to sleep properly. When you pull out your palmtop, intent on calming your brain down via application of the internet, it’s lit up with just about everyone’s name. AA’s is just a check-in, so you shoot her a message back first before attending to everyone else.

The days when nobody talked to you? Those were good days. You miss them.

— gallowsCalibrator [GC] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —   
GC: G3T M3 OUT OF H3R3  
GC: 1 H4V3 N3V3R SO FULLY 4PPR3C14T3D TH3 WORD CLOY1NG BUT TH4T 1S WH4T 3V3RYTH1NG SM3LLS L1K3!  
GC: 4ND B1TT3R! 1 H4D NO 1D34 TH1NGS COULD B3 BOTH CLOY1NG 4ND B1TT3R BUT H3R3 W3 4R3. TH1S 3XP3D1T1ON 1S C3RT41NLY 4N 3DUC4T1ON  
GC: 1 H4V3 T4K3N TO 3X1ST1NG 1N TH3 S4M3 BLOCK 4S VR1SK4 B3C4US3 SH3 JUST SM3LLS L1K3 HOT 1RON. WH1CH 1S NOT 4 PL34S4NT SM3LL! BUT MOR3 PL34S4NT TH4N WH4T3V3R 1S OOZ1NG OUT OF K4RK4TS 4ND K4N4Y4S GL4NDS  
TA: thiing2 ii diid not want two know about: vk’2 2mell2, kk’2 gland2, kn’2 gland2. po22iibly anythiing two do wiith the word ‘gland2’ iin general.  
GC: 4PPL3B3RRY!  
GC: 1 4M NOT JOK1NG WH3N 1 S4Y G3T M3 OUT OF H3R3. 3V3N YOUR P4RT1CUL4R BR4ND OF UNW4SH3D N3RD 1S MOR3 P4L4T4BL3 TH4N TH1S MOR4SS  
TA: you’re headiing back anyway and ii have no iidea where you even are.  
GC: YOU COULD 4SK, YOU KNOW. OUR LOC4T1ON 1S NO LONG3R R34LLY S3CUR3, G1V3N W3 H4V3 4 H3RD OF P3OPL3 FOLLOW1NG US 4ROUND TH3 COUNTRYS1DE  
TA: what  
TA: tz ii am two tiired for thii2 2hiit  
GC: WH4T D1D YOU TH1NK W3 W3R3 DO1NG, DUMMY?  
TA: ii don’t know! talkiing two people! not collectiing them!  
GC: >:/ 4PPL3B3RRY, YOU M4K3 4 G1RL ROLL H3R 3Y3S SOM3T1M3S.  
GC: YOU S1CC3D K4RK4T V4NT4S ON 4 PL4N3T FULL OF 1SOL4T3D, SC4R3D PUP43. WH4T D1D YOU 3XP3CT TO H4PP3N?  
TA: ii diidn’t expect hiim two start buiildiing hii2 own empiire!   
GC: W3LL, YOU GOT 1T. D1D YOU TH1NK W3 W3R3 4LL ON TH3 3DG3 OF STR4NGL1NG 34CH OTH3R B3C4US3 W3 W3R3 H4V1NG 4 LOV3LY W4LK 1N TH3 COUNTRYS1D3?  
TA: how are they even FOLLOWIING you, you have a DRAGON  
GC: 4R3 YOU HYP3RV3NT1L4T1NG?  
TA: YE2.  
GC: W3LL, DONT. WE DO H4V3 TH1NGS UND3R CONTROL. 1TS OUR P3RSON4L L1V3S 1MPLOD1NG  
TA: what are you even goiing two DO wiith them all, where are they even goiing two liive  
GC: NOT YOUR PROBL3M!   
TA: ii mean iit’2 not liike the drone2 are goiing two buiild them all hiive2 and there aren’t enough empty one2 for YOUR ENTIIRE ARMY over here  
GC: 1TS NOT MY ARMY! 1T M1GHT B3 *OUR* 4RMY. WOULD YOU TURN YOUR OWN ARMY OUT 1NTO TH3 M3RC1L3SS SUN 4ND L34V3 TH3M B3GG1NG FOR SH3LT3R, C4PTOR?  
GC: W3LL WORK 1T OUT. STOP P4N1CK1NG OR 1 W1LL B3 FORC3D TO 1SSU3 4 D3CL4R4T1ON OF C4LM YOUR T1TS  
TA: thii2 ii2 goiing two go 2o horriibly wrong.  
GC: 1F 1T DO3S TH3N TH3 ON3S L3FT C4N CONSTRUCT 4 SH3LT3R OUT OF BOD13S. W3 W1LL ST1LL H4V3 4PPROX1M4T3LY H4LF 4N 4RMY! M4YB3 4 TH1RD

You drag your hand down your face. Everything is terrible. Everything.

GC: DO NOT T3LL 4NYON3, BUT W3R3 CH1VVY1NG 4LL TH3S3 TROLLS 4LONG B3C4US3 K4RKR4B 1S 3X4CTLY 4S SOFT-H34RT3D 4S W3 KNOW H1M TO B3. TH3 POPUL4T1ON D3NS1TY OUT H3R3 1S T3RR1FY1NGLY LOW, WH1CH M34NS TH4T 4 LOT OF TH3M W3R3 GO1NG TO B3 KILL3D OFF ON CONCUP1SC3NT GROUNDS.  
GC: 1 TH1NK H3 HOP3S TH4T G3TT1NG 4S M4NY P3OPL3 1N TH3 S4M3 PL4C3 4S POSS1BL3 W1LL H3LP  
TA: great. ii regret ever jokiing about the matchmakiing 2erviice.  
GC: 1T M4Y NOT H4VE B33N 4 JOK3! 1 HOP3 YOU L1K3 D4T4 3NTRY  
TA: thii2 ii2 me offiiciially makiing thii2 not my problem.  
GC: 1 H4V3 B33N T3LL1NG YOU TH1S 4LL 4LONG. 1TS 4LMOST L1K3 1 W4S R1GHT TH3 WHOL3 T1M3!  
TA: ok fiine. look, how’2 kn?  
GC: S33TH1NG. 3XC3PT NOBODY 3LS3 C4N T3LL.  
GC: VR1SK4 1S VULTUR1NG 1N ON H3R FOR SOM3 R34SON 4ND K4RK4T 1S G3N3R4LLY H1D1NG, WH1CH 1 TH1NK 1S JUST M4K1NG H3R 4NGR13R  
GC: 4ND W3 4R3 NOT GO1NG TO G3T B4CK B3FOR3 1 MOULT SO 1F YOU 4R3 GO1NG TO B3 N33DL3SSLY OBS3SS1NG W1TH WORRY OV3R SOM3TH1NG TH3N TH4T 1S 4 MUCH B3TT3R CHO1C3 TH4N OUR 4RMY OF M1SCR34NTS  
TA: hey thank2 for that, ii’m 2o glad you’re thiinkiing of me.  
GC: 1 V4LU3 OUR R3L4T1ONSH1P H1GHLY  
GC: SO  
GC: DRON3S  
GC: 4ND TH3 4PPL1C4T1ON TH3R3OF  
TA: that wa2 an abrupt 2egue.  
GC: WH4T 4R3 YOU GO1NG TO DO? TH3 34RLY COLL3CT1ON H4S M3SSED TH1NGS UP W1TH MOULT1NG T1M3S 4ND ER1D4N M1GHT NOT H4V3 MOULT3D BY TH3 T1M3 YOU G3T NOT1C3  
GC: 1 H4V3 PUT TOO MUCH EFFORT 1NTO YOU FOR YOU TO G3T CULLED NOW  
GC: (NOT3 1 4M DO1NG YOU 4 NOT4BL3 F4VOUR 1N 4SSUM1NG YOU C4N H4NDL3 F1ND1NG 4 FLUSH3D P4RTN3R)  
GC: (1F YOU L3T M3 DOWN 1 W1LL N3V3R T4LK TO YOU 4G41N)  
TA: pre-moult 2lurry ii2 2tiill acceptable ii’m pretty 2ure. what are they goiing two do, kiill off all the 2eadweller2?  
TA: moultiing ju2t mean2 our bodiie2 can wiith2tand a2cen2iion. ii gue22 they combiined iit wiith collectiion becau2e 2pacefliight’2 a biig deal.  
GC: H3H3  
GC: COND3SC3 MUST B3 SO M4D R1GHT NOW  
TA: that’2 not really a good thiing  
GC: NO BUT 1T 1S H1L4R1OUS

That conversation having plateaued, because nothing can really beat going ‘u mad’ at Condesce, you move onto the next person trying to get your attention. Who is Feferi.

You really, really miss being the nerd-loner barely attached to your social circle. Which isn’t to say that Feferi is someone you dislike talking to - she’s smart, and sharp, and you actually kind of like her now that you’ve been inoculated to her presence in the labs of a night - but it is kind of stressful talking to the Heiress of the Alternian Empire. One minute she’ll just be Feferi, drawing on the walls with Nepeta and talking in a dialect that is at least 50% pun, and the next she’ll have dug up her mantle of authority from somewhere as she worries about problems you have zero frame of reference for. It makes conversations an exercise in stepping in cholerbear traps.

— cuttlefishCuller [CC] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —   
CC: Solelux, cod you message me back when you )(ave a minute?

You are very suspiciously eyeing the virtual ground for cholerbear traps. There’s probably one there.

TA: iim here  
TA: what2 up  
TA: iif you want permii22iion two 2trangle ed don’t hold back on my account  
CC: )(a)(a!   
CC: No, I just… Remember w)(en we talked about Mom?

And that would be the trap. You are not qualified to deal with this.

TA: ii remember  
CC: Everyfin’s getting closer and I )(ave no idea what to do!  
CC: Equifis)( told me that with current tec)(nology, Condesce could be )(ere in two months, which means if I want to do somefin about Mom, I )(ave to do it soon. But I keep finning about it and all I do is go in circles.  
CC: S)(e cod krill everyone, and she will if Condesce convinces her to. But s)(e’s my lusus. And efin if I tell mys)(ellf that I can use )(er to solidify my rule, the only reason I want )(er alive is B-ECOD s)(e’s my lusus.  
CC: S)(ould krill )(er. Don’t want to. Don’t efin know if I can.  
TA: wow  
TA: ff ii am not qualiifiied two help wiith thii2  
CC: I might need you to be.  
CC: I fin it’s going to take all the firepower we have, if I decide to krill her. So would you kelp? If I asked?

You close your eyes, considering. You have no fondness for the ocean, after everything you had to do to save Aradia. It’s laced with bloody memories, although you would have avoided it on general principle anyway; not going near seadwellers was a good survival tactic, until you started all this. But it is Feferi, and she’s asking, not ordering. Going after her lusus is nearly a death sentence, but so is anything you do at this point, and Gl’bgolyb is hardly a resource you want on Condesce’s side.

TA: ii’d help  
TA: iif you a2ked  
CC: T)(anks, Solelux.  
CC: I still )(ave no idea w)(at I’m doing, )(alibut at least you poor suckers are in it wit)( me.  
TA: ii’m pretty 2ure we’re all 2ayiing that riight about now  
TA: have you talked two kk recently  
CC: Recently enough. I told )(im that )(e was being a glubbing S—EADIOT and needed to follow Kanaya’s lead until t)(ey get back, and t)(en let )(-ER decide w)(ere to go from t)(ere. You know )(im and overfinning t)(ings, t)(oug)(.  
CC: I wis)( Kanaya )(ad a morayeel 38(   
TA: con2iideriing the optiion2 ii’m glad 2he doe2n’t  
TA: ii miight a2k aa two talk two her though  
TA: they can commii2erate over nearly beiing kiilled by fuckup2  
CC: 38/ I probably s)(oaldn’t )(ave laug)(ed at t)(at, s)(oald I?  
TA: ii diid  
TA: ff ii would talk more but iit2 pa2t miidday and ii have two fly back once the 2un 2et2  
CC: O)(!  
CC: W)(ale, go SL-E——EP t)(en, brainless! Araydia will N-EV—ER forgive me if you conk out in mid-air!  
TA: entiirely liikely  
TA: look iif you can get kk two focu2 on your problem he can probably giive you 2ome adviice that’2 more u2eful emotiionally  
TA: ii’m ju2t the mu2cle  
CC: Solelux, out of everyfin t)(at springs to mind w)(en I fin of you, mussel isn’t one of t)(em.  
TA: ouch my 2elf e2teem  
TA: later ff  
CC: Sleep w)(ale 38)  
— twinArmageddons [TA] has ceased trolling cuttlefishCuller [CC] —

Fuck. Things are actually happening, all right. Instead of dealing with it, you pull a sopor patch out of your captcha deck and go to sleep.


	22. Chapter 22

You wake up rough, going from ‘completely out’ to ‘flailing at your captcha deck and cursing the encryption modus you took off KK’s hands before he could injure himself with it’ without making any stops in between. Your palmtop is shrilling like crazy, and when you finally manage to de-encrypt it, the screen is so covered in notifications that you dismiss them all just to get some peace and quiet. Of course, it immediately starts filling up again, because the universe is dead-set against you getting what you want. You have to disable all sounds from the system menu before it finally shuts the fuck up.

There is no possible amount of sleep that could ever be enough to deal with this. Luckily, that’s been your state of existence for so long now that all you do is let out a heartfelt groan, peel the sopor patch off your arm, and jam your glasses onto your unimpressed face. Then you finally start reading the notifications.

 _Fuck_.

Okay, so the Vigenere you sent off ages ago is finally receiving a significant number of hits back from Fleet-side IPs. Still, the likelihood it’s managed to worm its way in anywhere really important is unlikely, you knew it was a long shot when you sent it off and just wanted to be _doing_ something, but-

You need an actual husktop. With a keyboard. Ascension is still so far off, Terezi not having moulted yet, it _can’t_ be the Fleet coming in for Ascension. Besides, you’re getting a lot of pingbacks, but not enough for the entire fucking Fleet of the Alternian Empire to be breathing down your necks. Fuck, this is too many for just one shi-

You don’t mean to screech “Fuck!” so loud that half your junked-up ship echoes with it, but at least it’s warranted in the situation. There aren’t enough pingbacks unless _a fucking battleship is descending on your heads_ , a battleship full of security and, and important people, and all the technicians and maintenance and administrators and support staff that come along with a ship the size of a colony and, oh, _Her Imperial Condescension_. You scrabble at the keyboard more than you deliberately type anything, and - okay. Okay. The latency is still ridiculous, which means the Battleship Condescension is unlikely to crash-land on your co-ordinates in the next ten minutes. Using FTL drives too near a planet is dangerous, and it looks like even Condesce isn’t going to risk turning the breeding grounds of the Alternian Empire into an asteroid belt. Even with an unimaginable amount of psionic power behind her, regular spaceflight is still going to be slow as fuck, and a ship the size of the Battleship Condescension would have had to exit FTL a fair way away.

Not far enough, you think, grimly, and start figuring out just where your code has managed to worm itself.

—

You push yourself hard flying back, only stopping to find shelter when your skin starts itching from the first hints of sun. You spend nearly the entire day cursing at relays as you try to figure out where exactly - or, more importantly, how far away exactly the Battleship Condescension is.

It’s not a sure thing that the ship you’re chasing down _is_ the Battleship Condescension. It could be a small cluster of supply ships, or a pre-Ascension scout crew if, for some reason, upstairs expects things to go all the way wrong with the early collection and Feferi’s presence. But you’re getting _so many_ hits back, and not spread out through relays like you’d expect for a mini-fleet - an armada? You wanted to be a ship, not arrange them delicately in the void of space.

As soon as the sun sets again, you’re back to flying. You’re going to need to replenish these calories, a distant part of your brain notes as the rest ticks over your results. Either that or go into a coma, probably, and now’s an inconvenient time for that. There’s not going to be a convenient time until after this whole mess is over and done with, and your coma might be a bit more permanent by then.

You skip your hive completely, figuring that this is probably an emergency situation, if a delayed one. It’s late again when you collapse outside Equius’ front door, too tired for a graceful landing. Aradia immediately rescues you, because she is a divine being and could probably feel your psi from a kilometre away.

“I know you missed me, but you didn’t have to come looking this worn-out,” she says, wrapping your arm over her shoulder. “I’m already pale for you.”

You half-smile at that, despite the danger looming on the horizon, and bump your cheek against hers. “Where’s everyone?” Your lisp comes out even worse than usual and you grimace. “Got news.”

“Well, that’s not alarming at all.” Aradia leads you down to the lab, carefully watching you on the stairs in case you think eating them might be a good idea. “Is it Vriska news?”

You snort at that. For once, there’s something more alarming than Vriska in your life. She’s going to be so pissed when she finds out. “Worse.”

Everyone stares at you when you let yourself into the lab, Feferi and Equius over a punctured robot and Eridan over a pile of books. Nepeta is absent, but she doesn’t spend much time hanging around, preferring to either brutally murder animals twice her size or lurk around her cave doing things you’ve never asked after. Maybe you should have, but your reputation as an anti-social jerk is almost like a pre-apology, there.

Patting Aradia on the face to reassure her that you’re not actually going to fall over, you drop your husktop on the table in the centre of the room and turn it towards Equius. He leans in and carefully, delicately scrolls through what you’ve laid out. When he understands it, he goes ashy-pale and carefully pulls his hand away. At least he respects your property enough to not completely lose his shit at it. Some robots are going to be destroyed soon, though, if you’re any judge.

Eridan, completely unable to stand a thing not being about him, takes your husktop and spins it to face himself, pushing his glasses up his nose. “Some a’ us ain’t nerds, Sol, you’re goin’ to have to perform us all the favour of explainin’ your incomprehensible bullshit.”

Aradia pushes you into a chair before taking the one beside you, sitting between you and Feferi. “Before you pass out would be good,” she agrees, and then pats your hand when you give her a look for agreeing with your kismesis.

All your tired has caught up with you now that you’ve sat down. You’re not hungry yet, but you assume it’s not going to be far behind, and you can barely think of where to start now. The Condesce could have picked a better time to return to local space. “When I was making a fake ident for KK,” you say, slowly. “Before. I was trying to think of ways I could get him through the system.”

Equius makes a noise. He hasn’t - probably wouldn’t cull Karkat, even now. You doubt he’s going to approve of your seditious ways, though, which is why you never told him exactly what you were using his equipment for and did all the suspicious stuff while he was looking after Aurthour. So a card, sure, but idents are meant to be reverse-engineer-proof.

It’s good being you, sometimes.

“The drone data encryption is unbreakable without a key,” you say, after contemplating your audience. “So I wrote a Trojan and put it in circulation in the Fleet to try to find a door in to get the key. Long shot.”

Eridan sits up and stares at you. “Are you sayin’ you can _reprogram the fuckin’ drones_?”

“No!” you yelp, then stop. Someone on the _Battleship Condescension_ would have to have the fucking Vigenere key. Question is how much time you can devote to getting it, which isn’t a lot. Probably not enough time before collection’s over, let alone before Condesce arrives. “Maybe,” you say, and shrug. “Probably not. The drones aren’t the point.”

“Aren’t the _point_ ,” Eridan mutters, slumping back in his chair. “Fuckin’ _hell_ , Sol.”

You ignore him instead of taking the bait. “The point is, those are all the pingbacks I got from the Trojan today. Local relays.”

There’s a soft silence as everyone bar you and Equius attempts to unravel this. You tip back on your chair and smother a yawn in the meantime, and don’t even budge a little when Eridan starts swearing. Aradia tilts her head, obviously thinking it over. Feferi stares at a wall, and at nothing, slowly rotating a gold bangle around her wrist. She doesn’t look scared, or even surprised. Just resigned, a flat expression that doesn’t suit her at all.

“Does Karkat know?” she asks, finally, still twisting the thin band of gold. Her look is less blank, more assessing, which you take as a hopeful sign.

“I was still tracking everything down when I stopped for the day,” you say, and shrug. “Haven’t had the chance to tell him.”

“I will,” Feferi says, and scoops up her trident before standing. “I have to leave now if I want to get home beshore sunrise. Eridan?”

Eridan blinks at her, still unused to being on civil terms despite the long hours you’ve all been putting in. “Yeah?”

Feferi takes a short breath, then sighs, her shoulders slumping. “Come back to my hive. I’m knot going to be sleeping, so we may ‘swell try to teach me who to sneer at and whose bass to kiss. You can talk to Karkat, too.”

It takes a moment for Feferi’s words to sink into Eridan’s auricular sponge clots, at which point his witty rejoinder is an audible gulp and a faint, “You said you’d put a cullin’ fork through my gills before you let me set foot in your hive again.”

“Eridan-” Feferi sighs again, a short huff of exasperation. “Are you coming or knot?”

Eridan stares at her a moment longer, then gives her a jerky nod, captchaloguing his pile of books. As Feferi leaves, but before Eridan turns away from you, you point two fingers at your eyes, then at him in clear warning. It seems to pick his spirits up, since he rolls his eyes and employs some fingers of his own before following in Feferi’s wake.

Aradia leans over, carefully angling her head so that she can rest it on your shoulder without decapitating either of you. Equius hastily gets up and moves back to his usual workbench, taking the torso of Feferi’s latest metal victim with him and leaving the two of you alone.

“Terezi’s moulting,” Aradia says, her voice so soft that even you barely hear it. “She asked me to tell you, said she couldn’t get through to you.”

You groan. “I probably deleted her notification with all the others. She okay?”

Aradia shrugs. You reach up carefully and tangle your fingers in her hair, press gently against her scalp until she relaxes boneless against you. “As okay as she can be. I think Vriska’s giving her shit, and I can’t tell her to back off without just making it worse.” There’s a sad note in her voice as she adds, “I’m sick of being stuck between Scourge Sisters.”

You’re sick of her being stuck between the Scourge Sisters too, but you’re pretty sure you’ll be stepping on a landmine if you say that. Instead, you just keep stroking your hand through Aradia’s hair, gently untangling knots until your fingers slide through without snagging. “Not your problem to sort out,” you say, finally, and hope that she picks up on the unspoken _so don’t get involved in it_. Reluctantly, you add, “I’ll talk to TZ, next time she’s online.”

The two of you sit in silence for a while, you because you’re so tired that flapping your mouth is an egregious waste of the energy you’re saving up to get to a cupe, and Aradia lost in her own thoughts. After a while, she says, hesitant, “So how long?”

You lean your head until it’s resting on hers and close your eyes because all of a sudden counting is an immense task. There’s too many variables, is the thing. “If she’s going full speed?” you say, and wave your hand in the air uncertainly. “Who fucking knows. Could be before FF even moults.” Which is a depressing thought - Feferi is good, but she’s not going to be able to hold her own against an adult as a pupa. And with how fine you’re cutting it, if Condesce comes in the _middle_ of her moult-

Well, apparently you have an army. It’s your army against the Empire, but you might at least be able to topple Condesce before the Empire can mobilise and wipe you all out.

This is an awful revolution. You should all be fired.

—

You don’t mean to close your eyes for longer than a minute, but Aradia is warm and comfortable, and you’ve been pushing yourself hard for four nights straight in a way that you don’t normally, and the next thing you know the lights are dimmed and Aradia is absent, though you can still feel the warmth of her against your side. Her waking up must have been what woke you up.

Equius is still in his corner, the stink of solder wafting over from his work. He must’ve decided on it as the least noisy option, to not disturb you and Aradia. You know better than to interrupt a guy melting metal, so you wait until he sets the soldering iron down to wander over and lean against his bench.

“Captor,” he says, terse as he carefully nudges his join to make sure it sets properly.

“Zahhak,” you say, mockingly terse because you’re an asshole. “Where’d AA go?”

Equius wipes his forehead with the back of his arm, an automatic reflex that he doesn’t notice, then picks up the soldering iron again. “The sun rose some hours ago. When she woke up, I offered her the use of Nepeta’s recuperacoon. She seemed loath to disturb you.” He carefully draws another line of solder, his voice turning even more absent than it already was. “I apologise for waking you.”

You watch his movements, neat and precise and controlled. You’ve seen him bend metal without a thought, punch the head off a robot (and you know how well he reinforces them), and it hardly seems like the same person in front of you. “Sorry for falling asleep.” A yawn takes you by surprise, and you don’t bother smothering it. You should probably eat something before you sleep again. “I didn’t really sleep on the way back.”

Equius makes a noise of acknowledgement, his focus fully on his work, then belatedly adds, “The only recuperacoon left is my own.” It seems abrupt, but you think it might be an apology more than anything else.

“I still have sopor patches.” You look closer at what he’s working on, then double-take. You figured he’d still be fixing up Feferi’s punching bag, but the skeleton laid off to the side is an arm, much finer than the work he does with things he’s likely to destroy. A set of plating is stacked up against the wall, buffed to nearly a mirror finish. That’s not going to last long. “You hadn’t even started when I left!” you say, indignant.

Equius’ hand shakes a little. How much sleep has he had? Probably not enough, you’re all running on fumes at the moment. “I was unable to progress without your assistance,” he mutters, and wipes his forehead again. “The neural interfaces are not my speciality, and I was - am - unsure on how to progress, given our materials.”

You decaptchalogue the coil of biowire you salvaged from Vriska’s wreck and dump it on his bench, away from the sprawl of Vriska’s new arm. “Problem solved.” As Equius puts down his soldering gear and picks up the biowire to inspect it, you say, “Vriska doesn’t know about this.” Your tone is carefully neutral, perhaps a little too neutral, and you catch an alarmed look over the top of his glasses.

He looks back down at the biowire, weighing the coil in his hands. “Ah,” he says, eventually, and coils it back up in a neater loop than you managed. “Well, we should be able to complete the neural relays, with this. It would have been difficult to replicate.”

You nod, although the task suddenly feels immense even with that barrier removed. You have a deadline now - _dead_ line, just to put the stress where it’s needed most. You hook over a chair with your psionics and sit down more heavily than you intend to, your exhaustion catching up with you again. “I’ll just-” you say, reaching for a pen, not actually sure what you’re going to do with it.

Equius places a hand to block you from the pen and says, “Captor,” not entirely unkindly. He blanches a little when you give him a look, but then says, “I will not tolerate you scribbling over my blueprints.” You almost bristle, but then the faint note - the very _faintest_ , he really needs to work on his delivery - of humour comes through.

“I’m gonna fix them all tomorrow,” you tell him, and drop your hand. “In red _and_ blue. Your labelling is atrocious.” Deliberately, you hook the corner of your mouth up in a smile, to take the sting out of it. You can be a caustic asshole when people aren’t used to you, because you never bothered to get used to people.

Equius’s face doesn’t change. You can’t remember if you’ve ever seen him display a _good_ emotion before. Still, he isn’t horribly offended at you. He seems indulgent, almost, amused at your antics. You’ve probably lost a good amount of your filter, being as tired as you are, so before you can do anything else you’ll probably regret after a solid day’s sleep you shut yourself up by finding an energy bar and shoving it in your mouth. You always keep a few on you, in case of psionic emergency, since Aradia was going to shove them in your deck with or without your help.

“There is food,” Equius says, turning back to his work. “Aurthour would be- pleased, to arrange a meal.”

You consider the rest of the energy bar, then bin it before it can inflict any more of itself upon you.

—

Aurthour is ecstatic to have someone who isn’t Nepeta to butler around after, and before you quite know what’s happened, you’re wrapped up in a blue blanket on a seating slab about the size of your respiteblock, finishing off a plate of exquisitely-arranged fruit. It’s not a life you’re used to, nor one that you’d _choose_ , but it turns out you’re more than okay to take the lap of luxury for all it’s worth while you have it.

You’re pretty sure Aradia would have a few words for you if you let slip that fruit is apparently the lap of luxury. To be fair, it is some _incredibly fucking fancy_ fruit. You don’t even know what half of it is called.

The patch of sopor you slap on is going to take some time to kick in, despite your exhaustion. You’ve gone through to the other side of tired now, elated wakefulness spackled over the parts of your brain telling you to sleep, so you idly thumb through bullshit that doesn’t matter on your palmtop to kill time before you pass out.

— gallowsCalibrator [GC] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —   
GC: GU3SS WH4T 1M M4K1NG 1LL3G4L  
GC: S3X  
GC: S3X 1S NOW 1LL3G4L  
TA: that 2eem2 liike iit would pre2ent a problem  
GC: PR3V3NT1ON 1S B3TT3R TH4N 4 CUR3!  
GC: TH3 CUR3 1S F4T4L >:[  
TA: ok what ii2 iit thii2 tiime  
TA: and why do you keep telliing me about iit, ii can’t do 2hiit  
GC: 1 4M 4LSO CURR3NTLY 1NC4P4BL3 OF SH1T  
GC: 1M MOULT1NG 4ND K4N4Y4 1S SL33P1NG W1TH POSS1BLY 3V3RYON3  
TA: ii  
TA: 2eriiou2ly why the fuck are you telliing me  
TA: thii2 ii2 2o far beyond my fuckiing pay grade  
TA: you’re the one who p2ychoanaly2e2 everyone  
GC: H3NC3 TH3 N3W 1LL3G4L1TY OF S3X  
GC: 1 COULD TOL3R4T3 1T W3R3 1T FOR TH3 GR34T3R GOOD  
GC: BUT NOOOO GO SL33P 1N YOUR CUP3 T3R3Z1 W3 H4V3 TH1S H4NDL3D WOULDNT W4NT YOU G3TT1NG CONC1L14TORY 1D34S  
GC: TH3Y W1SH 1 H4D CONC1L14TORY 1D43S  
TA: you do kiind of 2ound liike you have a few conciiliiatory iidea2  
TA: …waiit, when you 2ay everyone  
GC: NO 4PPL3B3RRY MY COMR4D3S 1N 4RMS 4R3 NOT D3B4UCH3D TO TH3 PO1NT OF T3RR1BL3 3MOT1ON4LLY-STUNT3D THR33W4YS Y3T  
GC: 1 4LMOST W1SH TH3Y W3R3  
GC: 1T H4S B33N DR4WN OUT OV3R 4 NUMB3R OF D4YS 4ND 1 SM3LL MOR3 B1TT3R CONFUS1ON 4ND T3RR1FY1NG CH4SMS TH4N 1 DO 4NY D3B4UCH3RY  
GC: G1V3N MY ST4T3 1 SUPPOS3 TH4T 1S B3TT3R BUT 1 W1SH TH3Y WOULD JUST STOP  
GC: 4S SOON 4S MY 4RMS 4R3 L3SS NOODL3-L1K3 1 4M GO1NG TO G1V3 TH3M 4LL SUCH 4 DRUBB1NG  
TA: ok. well thii2 ii2 fuckiing dii2a2trou2.  
TA: whatever you do, don’t 2tart wiith vk.  
GC: BUT ST1CK1NG MY N3CK UND3R TH3 GU1LLOT1N3 1S SO T3MPT1NG >:[  
GC: 4PPL3B3RRY, 1 DO NOT N33D YOU TO F1X TH1NGS FROM WH3R3 YOU 4R3  
GC: 1 N33D YOU TO 4GR33 TH4T S3X 1S NOW FOUR HUNDR3D 4ND TH1RT33N P3RC3NT 1LL3G4L 4ND COMM1S3R4T3 W1TH M3  
TA: 2o iillegal. ab2olutely not a corner2tone of our 2ociety at all.  
TA: only the real deviiant2 actually fuck each other, ii don’t know iif ii want two be on the 2ame planet a2 the2e lo2er2.  
GC: F1N4LLY SOM3ON3 WHO S33S TH3 TRUTH OF TH3 M4TT3R  
GC: UGH TH3YR3 4RGU1NG 4G41N  
GC: 1F 1 STOP M3SS1NG 4ROUND ON MY P4LMTOP 1 C4N PROB4BLY F4LL 4SL33P B3FOR3 MOR3 D3B4UCH3RY OCCURS  
GC: DONT FORG3T TO BR1NG UP M4K1NG S3X 1LL3G4L TO M1SS R4SPB3RRY D3L1GHT 1 AM SUR3 1T W1LL GO OV3R W3LL  
TA: 2leep well ii gue22. don’t diie before you make iit back, that would be iinconveniient.

—

You wake up cocooned in blanket, having curled up into the smallest ball you could manage during the day. There’s noise coming from the nutrition block, but you take a moment to stare blearily at the ceiling before peeling the sopor patch off your arm. Your palmtop falls out of the blanket when you untangle yourself - you don’t remember putting it anywhere, which means you probably fell asleep with it and then kicked it around by tossing and turning.

Regretfully, you fold up the blanket and leave it at the end of the seating block. The basement lab is usually pretty warm, being an enclosed space with a bunch of heat-producing machines and dubious ventilation, but the rest of Equius’ hive… well, the blueblood tendency to put spires on everything doesn’t do them any favours in terms of drafts, and night is fucking cold out here. It doesn’t help that you’re in the thinnest jeans and shirt your wardrobifier has ever produced, almost as confused over your new adulthood as you are.

Nepeta and Feferi are in the nutrition block when you finally stumble in, their conversation going quiet the instant they see you. You wave a hand at them in what is possibly the barest minimum of social decency you can bring yourself to muster and set to the task of finding something to put water in, so you’re not guzzling it from your hands in front of other people.

Feferi stabs at a thin slice of unidentifiable meat, shoving it in her mouth before leaning against the counter. Out of the corner of your eye, you can see her fins drooping, and the dark smudges under her eyes. You guess she really didn’t sleep much over the day. “I think I made him angry,” she says, mournfully, and you tense up. Eridan has obviously put his foot in it again. “I was doing so _whale_ , breaking him out of his shell!”

Nepeta drums her feet against a cupboard, a thoughtful look on her face. After swallowing her chunk of meat, she says, “Equihiss doesn’t like being broken out of his shell. He was furry careful in building it up.”

“I _minnow,_ but!” Feferi makes a frustrated gesture somewhere between stomping her foot and strangling an invisible opponent. “I need him to _kelp_ me and he’s- yes, Heiress, no, Heiress, may I lick your unworthy-of-the-throne shoes, Heiress and he won’t just decide to either like me or knot! I can work with either, but I need to know what to do next, and-” She stabs another chunk of meat with a jab that makes her fork screech against the plate, and shoves it into her mouth before remembering you’re there. “Solelux, he likes _you_ , what did you do?”

You nearly drop the glass you’ve finally found and only barely resist nervous hysterical laughter. It’s too early for this. “He thinks I either don’t know my place or I’m wasting myself, FF, ask NP if you want tips on winning EQ over.”

Nepeta rolls her eyes and jumps off the counter, still a smidge taller than you after her moult and far taller than Feferi. “Equihiss builds walls,” she says, in the most condescending tone you’ve ever heard - and you interact with Eridan on a semi-regular basis. “He tells me that I’m a silly, defenseless greenblood who’s nefur going to cut it in the real world, beclaws I like purrtending I’m a cat. I know he’s wrong, and he knows he’s wrong, but it makes him comfurtable to have boxes to put people in.”

You think of Nepeta’s shipping walls and bite your tongue.

“So the fact that he’s trying to come up with boxes fur you?” Nepeta shrugs. “He’s trying to figure out how to be furends.” She flicks Feferi in the forehead on her way out. “ _Duh_.”

Feferi reaches up and rubs her forehead without seeming to realise she’s doing it. “Ow,” she says, and you don’t think she’s talking about the mark Nepeta left there.

“While you’re waiting for EQ to decide if you’re a worthy Heiress or not,” you say, reaching past Feferi for something to make your stomach shut up, “I think there’s something I can do to help the rebel cause.” There’s a perfectly good Trojan floating around the Alternian Empire with its strings attached to your fingers, after all, and just because you can’t use it to crack the drones doesn’t mean you can’t use it.

Feferi nods, so exhausted she doesn’t even ask what you want to do. Two hours later, you - with both Feferi and Equius hovering over you the whole time - you’ve cut up footage of Karkat’s speeches that he’s been sending to Feferi, stripped off any identifying metadata, thrown together some text files of chatlogs in which they’ve planned their approach and torn through issues together (and changed Karkat’s text to an eye-watering red, just to give it that extra punch), made a few disjointed packages with bits and pieces obviously missing, and have started distributing them to the furthest reaches of the Empire. The internet’s a sucker for a good conspiracy.

“Well,” Aradia says, sauntering over from the bench she and Eridan took over about fifteen minutes into the first Feferi vs. Equius deathglare contest over your rash course of action. “Ready for more bruises, Heiress?”

Feferi squares her shoulders. “Knot tonight,” she says, and there’s steel in her tone. It suits her better than gold. “Tonight’s _your_ turn.”


	23. Chapter 23

With the Battleship Condescension looming, you stop paying attention to what everyone else in your awful revolution is doing, throwing yourself into finishing the helmsrig. It’s going to be hacked-together as _shit_ , and there’s not even a guarantee it’ll work given the lack of testing opportunities, but Karkat is bringing an army to you. Feferi needs something to tempt them to stay loyal once Karkat stops yelling at them.

Equius seems happy enough to join you in your obsessive planning. You end up passing out in the lab most mornings to the sound of machinery, usually with a marker in your hand and a massive headache from messing with biowire. Without fail, when day terrors wake you up because you’re an idiot who forgot to slap on a patch of sopor _again_ , there’s a clean blanket draped over you that helps them dissipate. You should be paranoid about it, really, but you’re kind of stuck in Equius’ hive as things are. Plus, at this point, you’re pretty sure it’s just some sort of weird highblood concept of manners that Aurthour managed to instill in him.

The problem with being absorbed by your work is that you don’t notice anything that can’t be blueprinted. Which is an advantage, sometimes, but you’re bad enough at people that you like to stay on top of what they’re doing, so you don’t stick your foot in it later. Still, it’s officially drone season; the notice - or word of mouth, given that your cohort has been completely denied official notice beyond the necessary - means that there is a _wealth_ of interactions that you’re missing. And normally you would be glad about missing those particular interactions, but in the moments where you can spare a few brain cycles, you are really starting to believe that your inclade is going to implode.

Still, it’s not like you’re any good at sorting out interpersonal crises. You dedicate yourself to migraines for the greater good and leave Equius to deal with any Heiress problems that require technical input. He might also be talking about the midblood plight, but one: you’re either too busy or too in pain to notice and two: you don’t care.

Aradia drags you away from your latest experiments on attaching biowire to synthetic nerves four days of sleeping three-hour shifts in, the familiar feel of her psionics pulling at you the only thing saving her from a flight across the room. You flail at your experiment nonetheless, screeching, “AA, I _almost had it-_ ”

“I don’t care,” she says. You stop struggling, because even if you couldn’t see the dark circles under her eyes, you can _hear_ them. You guess you’re not the only one throwing yourself too hard at everything. “Everyone’s snappish and on their last nerve, and I’m tired, and if Eridan loftily explains something to me that I understand better than him one more time I am going to _snap his smug neck_.” She dumps you on the ground now that you’re not trying to get back to your work. “We’re _eating_.”

You grab her hand and squeeze, smooth the back of it with a thumb. “I could eat,” you say, even though you’ve run the timelines in your head and eating doesn’t really factor into it if you want to get this done on time. You’re probably going to have to start actually using the sopor patches - you can’t afford for the little sleep you get to be worthless. Still, AA is more important. You’d let the world burn for her.

—

The one good thing about using Equius’ hive as a base of operations, other than the incredibly specialised equipment and the lack of neighbours screeching at you whenever something goes wrong with the electricity, is Aurthour. He refuses be anything less than a gracious host to the four or five extra of you, feeding you up and generally fussing over you. It’s not like your lusus is letting you starve in the sun, but Aurthour’s attentiveness is another level entirely.

He knows what you like. _You_ don’t even know what you like; you’ve become a great proponent of the ‘shove indeterminate calories in facehole’ method of eating, over the sweeps.

You and Aradia lean against each other, sitting on the same side of the uncomfortably long table instead of across from each other. She relaxes, bit by bit, as you idly trace patterns into her arm, your arm slung over her shoulders. The chill of her metal bites into you, a little, but it’s not quite uncomfortable, so you just take the chance to sit with your moirail.

She crunches her way through half a pear before giving the rest to you and settling against you with a yawn. The time is a complete mystery, since you’ve been living in a basement and haven’t been keeping an eye on the clock - it could be time for normal people to sleep, for all you know. It’s going to be inconvenient if she traps you here, though.

“Terezi finished moulting,” Aradia says, and wriggles until she’s more comfortable against your thinly-disguised skeleton. She nearly clocks you with a horn in the process, which you avoid with the ease of long practice. You had more than your fair share of bruised chins and cheekbones before you figured out how to properly crane your neck away. “They’re heading back pretty fast, to try to get here before Vriska starts melting.”

You slice off a sliver of pear with psionics and crunch on it thoughtfully, then feed Aradia a slice when she makes a disgruntled noise. “How’s the army gonna keep up with Pyralspite?”

“Nobody was particularly forthcoming,” she says, drier than dust. “I imagine they’ve found a few psionics.”

The two of you sit in silence for a while, only the faint hiss the pear makes when you slice through it with psi breaking up your thoughts. You, predictably, think of the helmsrig and how much work it still needs. Equius is going to be distracted by Vriska’s arm, too, which means a lot of the grunt work is going to fall on your shoulders. Aradia’s thoughts are a mystery, and for once you’re not all that inclined to know them. There’s enough shit happening that you can’t deal with. You’d clear mental room for AA, of course, but you trust her to tell you when that’s necessary.

Trusting her to keep herself out of stupid danger is another thing entirely.

“How’s FF doing?” you ask her.

Aradia chews on a lip thoughtfully. “She’s good,” she says, finally. “Making her go up against me is kind of unfair, with the psionics and inbuilt shields and everything, but she holds her own. She can take down the bots Equius builds most times now, and he just bumped them up to the hardest difficulty.”

“But,” you say, hearing it in Aradia’s voice.

“But,” she agrees. “But Condesce is an adult and bigger and stronger, but Condesce has a long lifetime of training to fall back on, but Feferi’s either going to be moulting or barely-moulted when she has to face the challenge, but.”

You finish the pear and lean back against your chair, slumping down in it. You’re more tired than you want to admit, more tired than you’ve been complaining about to yourself. “This has to work,” you tell Aradia, letting your eyes shut as you tilt a little of your weight onto her, the two of you keeping each other propped somewhat upright. “It can’t _not_.”

Aradia reaches up and cups your face with her hand, smoothing her thumb across your cheek. “It could very easily not,” she says, because your moirail talks to ghosts and digs up evidence of plans not working as a hobby and is kindly - so very _kindly,_ in a way you could never manage - realistic. “It wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world. At least we’ve tried, even with everything stacked against us.”

Your moirail is good for you. You like binary states; either you’ve won or you’ve lost, and it doesn’t matter how thin the margin between the two is. Failure is failure. Aradia builds something out of that, though, every single time. She learns. She _makes things better_ , and you have no idea why she’s so stuck on Vriska, when she should have learned long ago that Vriska can’t be made better.

You all have your weak spots, you guess.

—

The nights kind of blur together, after that. You’re pulling double-duty, which at least has the upside of being able to join the pun club, but sucks in every single other way. General safety guidelines like ‘don’t eat in the lab’ got tossed out before you ever started this insane venture, but now the guidelines that matter, like ‘don’t stab yourself with ancient biowire’ and ‘no passing out on the bench full of sharp tools’ are starting to go, too, and Aradia and Equius eventually manage to calmly argue you into spending a day in your own cupe when they find you asleep, your head dangerously close to a soldering iron that you may have forgotten to turn off when you stopped using it three hours before.

Your hair is only _slightly_ singed. They’re probably over-reacting, but the idea of a whole day spent sleeping sounds so decadent that you nod your way peaceably through the stereo lecture and let Aradia herd you to your hive, even if there’s no point since she’s spending the rest of the night chasing around Feferi and thus can’t stay. You intend to fuck around on the internet and see how your lovingly-crafted propaganda is spreading, but you blink and find yourself under rapidly-cooling water, then blink again and are somehow in your cupe, and after that it feels like too much effort to do anything but slide down to your nose in sopor and pass out.

You forget to take your glasses off, but that’s not anything new, these nights.

Instead of waking up at a reasonable hour, you sleep straight through your alarm - or, to be more accurate, you hit snooze five times and your palmtop gives up in despair. The thing that actually wakes you up is someone banging on your door, which jolts you upright and has you scrubbing off sopor with a towel before you realise you’re awake. “Coming!” you yell at the door, because your neighbours are pissy as fuck and this is going to get you dirty looks whenever you bother to use the hallways until Ascension. “Not dead!” you add as you stumble into a pair of pants, because it’s probably one of your rebel alliance, and your maestro performance at ignoring your snooze button could possibly have worried them.

You yank open the door expecting Aradia and get Eridan instead. Aradia probably wouldn’t have bothered with knocking, now that you’re thinking on it. You’re still covered in slime from the waist up, your hair is making a bid to be taller than your horns, and you’re pretty sure your glasses are cemented to your face - and Eridan comments on none of it. Instead he looks at you, subdued, before ducking his head and muttering, “You goin’ to let me in, or what?”

Still way too asleep for dealing with Eridan’s apparent personality switch, you stand back and let him in, then shut the door behind him.

He makes himself at home, loosening his scarf and throwing his cape over the back of your chair, which is somewhat reassuring on the subject of mysterious doppelgangers. You and Karkat may have watched too many bad horror movies about Imperial cloning facilities gone rogue when you were younger, but at least you’ll never be caught out by sudden changes of behaviour. After that, he looks at you like his tongue’s dried up in his mouth. Never one to rescue someone from an awkward moment, you grab your towel and start scrubbing off the sopor you missed while waiting for him to figure out standard Alternian again.

“Your hair’s fuckin’ horrendous,” he says, after a couple minutes, still too quiet.

“At least I have an excuse,” you respond, wariness finally creeping in around your sleep-ridden pan’s edges. “ED-”

He sighs and fishes out his palmtop, unlocks it, then hands it to you. Even as barely-awake as you are, you can’t miss the Imperial red and fuchsia plastered across the screen.

“Ah,” you say, not bothering to read it. The subject line is clear enough; Eridan’s gotten notice that he’d best contribute to the Empire, or the Empire will no longer contribute to him. “Well, you’ve still got a week, KK’s on his way back already.”

Eridan stares at you, then carefully places his head in his hands, propping his elbows on his knees, his fins held stiffly in place with nary a twitch to give you a clue to what he’s thinking. “Sol, you unmitigated, unabridged, absolute fuckin’ _moron_ , I wasn’t thinkin’ of the obligation I gotta fill with _Kar_.”

You freeze in place, acutely aware of the sopor drying in your hair. This is - not the worst time, you can think of times that would be worse, but certainly not something you had scheduled in your mental agenda for the night. You shouldn’t have slept through that fifth alarm, you could already have showered and brushed your teeth and pretended to be less disgusting than you actually are. “Now?” you finally manage to get out, and hope Eridan ignores the way your voice cracks.

Eridan looks up at you just so you can watch his mounting incredulity. “If you want to wait much longer, you ain’t goin’ to have much of a chance! No fuckin’ _pressure_ , though, Sol.” Abruptly, he cuts himself off. “I mean-”

You don’t want to watch Eridan grimace his way through a probably-Karkat-influenced _no I really mean no pressure, I’ll just go lie down in a ditch somewhere an’ wait for the drones to catch up_ , so you say, “I’m going to shower,” and abscond to the ablutionsblock before he can do anything more than stutter.

Once you shut the door, you lean on it and shove two knuckles into your mouth, biting down before you start hyperventilating. The drones were - they were out west somewhere! Or east, or something, just- _not here_ , you hadn’t expected this so soon, you haven’t got anyone in your flush quadrant and - there’s no way you’re going to ask AA _now_. You flick on the taps of your ablutions stall with psionics so that Eridan doesn’t realise you’re just panicking in here and stare into your one tiny mirror. Eridan can still pass so long as he has both matesprit and kismesis contributions, anyway. They can’t cull him for you not having a matesprit, they’d have to raze down half the planet, then.

This and the sleep-in are going to put you _so far behind_ on the helmsrig. At least the dark circles under your eyes are less likely to start forming their own event horizon.

—

You feel calmer once you’re showered and dressed, which isn’t saying much, but every little bit helps at this point. You scrubbed your skin raw and your gums might actually be bleeding a little from the scouring you gave your teeth, but so long as you can focus on that, you can ignore how big a deal this actually is.

Awkwardness descends as soon as the two of you make eye contact, but that’s kind of inevitable, considering. When he doesn’t vacate your chair, you sit on the desk instead, shoving your keyboard and roughly four thumbdrives away to clear a space.

“So,” Eridan says, stilted. “Do you-?” Purple spreads out to his fins, staining paths through the membranes, and he tries again. “Are you serious about bein’ my kismesis, or?”

It’s your turn to be speechless, apparently. After _all the shit_ he’s given you, the bullshit about you being _his_ like you’re some kind of - okay, like you’re the helmsman you spent so long wanting to be, but all his stupid smug _knowing_ and he still wants to make you jump through his fucking hoops, like KK’s ‘are we still friends’ fuckery-

-oh. Apparently you manage, through no fault of your own, to lure _complete idiots_ to your side. You can see how it all connects in his head, how he fucked up so spectacularly with Feferi that he was slapped upside the head by everyone with an opinion, how he didn’t make a move on KK until you shoved them together, how tentative he was with _you_ , the most abrasive, straightforward douchebag on the planet. Fuck. Apparently he listened to everyone lecturing him better than you gave him credit for.

It’s awkward, doing this with an Imperial mandate. So far things have just happened, and you’ve been too tired or manic or too tripped-up on him talking circles around you to think about what you’re doing. For all that this is important, it’s not special to you - but it is to him, and you can grasp the edges of why, and you’d pity him for it if you weren’t sure that Karkat already had that covered. Still, he’s managed to get into your life somehow, and it’s kind of touching in the most irritating way that he thinks he still doesn’t belong.

You reach over the scant distance between you, twining your hands in his scarf. To his credit, he meets your carefully-neutral look with one of his own, although the painful-looking swallow nearly ruins it.

He’s pared you down to the worst of you, already, over the sweeps since the FLARP incident. Your desire to throw yourself away, your rage and carelessness, your apathy and inability to care about people without breaking off pieces of yourself. Now he gets to see the best of you, and you _know_ he’ll hate it just as much as he hates the worst.

“You,” you begin, carefully biting off each word, “belong to me, Eridan Ampora.” He blinks, processing the words, and you yank him in with a sharp jerk, but not far enough to be useful. “Somehow you haven’t fucked up. Somehow you’ve even managed to repair some of the damage you caused. Somehow you’ve been able to control yourself long enough to see the rest of us as _people_.” You yank again, and shove the chair out from under him with psionics, leaving him kneeling with both your hands wrapped around the scarf. He’s confused, looking at you, but hopeful, and _oh_ you could get used to this, if you’re going to let yourself. You didn’t have to tear off a piece of you to give to him; he’s done that himself, and he doesn’t even realise.

“Sol,” he says, so uncertain, waiting on you. His hands don’t twitch from the scarf, even though he only grabbed it when he thought he was falling.

You let your psionics flare up, beyond caring about the comfort of your neighbours. They’re going to have a lot more to complain about in a few minutes, if you have your way. “ED. I’m going to make sure you don’t fuck up for the rest of your mothergrub-forsaken _life_.”

His eyes go wide and purple floods his fins right out to the edges. It’s exactly the reaction you were hoping for.

—

You give up on any and all delusions you had of putting in a night’s work. Well, on the helmsrig, anyway; nobody can argue you haven’t put in hard work elsewhere. The two of you eventually had to stop, since you hadn’t eaten before Eridan showed up, and there’s only so much two bodies can take. He drowses in the blue half of your cupe, while you lounge at your computer, covered in bruises and teethmarks and feeling more smug than you have in a long time.

This kismessitude thing is good for you.

Aradia’s messaged you a couple times. Less than you thought she would, but she does have an Heiress to strife with, so you don’t feel too neglected. The first message is a _where are you_ , but the second is an _actually dont come here_ , which makes your eyebrows shoot up your face without waiting for the signal from your brain to do so. Some messages from Equius, of all people, clear things up.

— centaursTesticle [CT] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —   
CT: D—> Captor  
CT: D—> It w001d behoof you to remain absent from my hive for the foreseeable future  
CT: D—> Vriska has returned due to her moult beginning and will require my attention for some time  
CT: D—> I  
CT: D—> presume  
CT: D—> you w001d prefer to not % paths  
TA: yeah, 2afe bet.  
TA: ju2t. keep an eye on her and aa and let me know iif thiing2 2tart goiing 2outh.

It takes a while for Equius to reply, during which you entertain fantasies of there being nothing left of his hive but a smoking crater thanks to you being too distracted to stop your moirail and the most volatile person on the planet from going supernova.

CT: D—> I  
CT: D—> Do not believe there is cause to worry  
CT: D—> I have informed Vriska that she is e%pected to hold to a code of behaviour while she resides in my home  
CT: D—> And that I will take STRONG e%ception to any violations  
TA: 2TRONG exceptiion?  
CT: D—> In the event that she violates the boundaries I have stated, she w001d be declaring her arm forfeit  
CT: D—> And I have arranged to remand her into Pyrope’s custody  
TA: wow yeah that’d do iit. thank2, eq.  
CT: D—> I  
CT: D—> E%cuse me  
CT: D—> Tests need to be run on the arm  
— centaursTesticle [CT] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —

Well, no wonder Aradia doesn’t want you around. You still kind of want to go drag her away from Vriska and shake her until she chooses a more sensible kismesis, but, at this point, you’re fairly sure it isn’t going to work. And Equius is probably better at pulling them apart, anyway.

You figure you, Vriska, and Aradia can exist in twos. You and Vriska, there’s nothing she can do except screech at you. Vriska and Aradia, Aradia knows how to handle. The three of you? You end up with a smoking hole in the ground. It’s probably better that you stay away, in the end.

The propaganda you sent out into the world is doing well, some of it even trickling Fleet-side thanks to someone on the Battleship Condescension and their desire for entertainment outweighing the common sense to not breeze past every security dialog known to trollkind. You are going to have some _words_ with whoever’s in charge of network security if you all make it past Ascension.

You still haven’t received collection orders. That’s something, at least. More time to ignore the problem, and you are a consummate professional at ignoring problems. It’s how you survived the first few sweeps of your friendship with Karkat, so it can’t be that bad a tactic.

While you’re deluding yourself, you might as well make the most of the unexpected night off. You turn off your screen and go to kick Eridan into the other half of your recuperacoon. Either you’ll get the side you want or you’ll get a distraction, and both are welcome at this point.

—

Eridan doesn’t budge from the cupe as it gets closer to sunrise, so you assume that he’s deigning to stay in your inferior hivestem for the time being. He’s exhausted, and you’re exhausted - but there’s a full pail in each of your sylladices, and you’re pointedly not thinking about the other half of your obligation to the Empire, and it’s almost like you’re content.

He wakes up earlier than you, of course. The only shit you have around to eat is the sort that doesn’t go off - you’ve been camping at Equius’ hive lately, no point in buying stuff you’re not gonna use - which means you find him scowling at a bowl of cereal while he works up the wherewithal to eat it dry. With no such compunctions yourself, you hoist yourself up onto the counter and start eating it out of the box.

“You are a fuckin’ disaster, Captor,” he informs you darkly, his voice still rough and clogged-up with sleep. You shrug, because you might be a disaster but you’re a disaster that hates washing dishes. That exchange done, Eridan turns his attention back to his palmtop, thoroughly ignoring you. _Someone_ isn’t an evening person.

You’re content to let him be, until you notice his aggressive squint at the palmtop. “Lost your glasses?” you ask, a tad smug; you were both rather distracted from wherever your clothes ended up, but you managed to find _yours_.

He pats at his face, then freezes and shoots you a look that’s half mortification and half loathing, pulling his glasses out of a pocket of the cape still draped over the back of your chair and shoving them on his face. “Forgot after I showered,” he mutters, and goes back to staring at his palmtop.

Somewhat rattled, you put down the box of cereal. You’re bad at people, sure, but even you can pick up on the clipped sentences and avoidance. “ED-” you say, the words drying up on your tongue. _Did I do something wrong,_ you want to ask, but it’s too vulnerable and _wrong_ , and you’ve never had to deal with this shit before. Maintaining a relationship with AA has always been like breathing, and you’ve already dealt with the worst thing that could happen, with her.

Eridan looks up at you. He’s starting to get traceries of purple in his eyes, moulting finally catching up to the highbloods. You wonder if he’ll get to moult before your revolution goes off, let alone Feferi; from what you’ve found on the net, it usually takes seadwellers a little longer. You’re kind of enjoying being taller than him, though. “Sol,” he finally says, wary and prompting.

Fuck, you wish AA was here to lovingly call you an idiot and tell you what to say. Since she’s dealing with her own kismesis issues and has unwisely left you to your own devices, however, you carefully avoid Eridan’s gaze and mutter, in the general direction of your lap, “Last night…”

“What about it?” he asks, exactly as cagey and wary as you are. “Sol…” When you utterly fail to get any words out, at a loss to where to go from here that doesn’t flay open a nerve, he says, “You ain’t gonna fuckin’ ditch me an’ make me find someone else _now_ , are you?”

“No!” you yelp. “What the _fuck_ , ED, you’re the one who can’t fucking look at me-”

Eridan buries his face in his hands, crushing his glasses into his face. After a moment, he says, muffled, “I _just fuckin’ woke up,_ Sol, an’ the only caffeine you got around here are those fuckin’ vile energy drinks. _Expired_ , I might add. An’ Kar’s panickin’ at me.”

“Oh,” you say, lamely.

Eridan pulls himself together and rubs at where the glasses have dug an angry mark into his face. “The ident you made. How fuckin’ droneproof is it?”

You shrug, helpless. “The system thinks he’s an entirely different person, and as far as I could find out, the drones themselves don’t actually do much in the way of culling decisions so long as the slurry’s from two partners and nobody’s doubling up on their registration.”

“So it’s trolls that do the-” he waves at his eyes awkwardly, “-the checkin’, then? At Ascension?” At your nod, he sighs, shoulders slumping. “Fef’ll have it by then,” he says, leaving off the possibility that she won’t - in which case, Karkat’s mutations will hardly be the defining reason for his culling.

“How far off is he?” you ask, finally picking up your box of cereal again.

Eridan snorts, and gives his palmtop a final glance before turning the screen off and tucking it away. There’s something fond and unguarded in his eyes that you’re not meant to see, and it almost makes you blush. You have lost all rationality over this stupid, pretty seadweller. “He’s bein’ fuckin’ cagey for someone with an army followin’ him around, but Vris wasn’t so far ahead of him. They’re thinkin’ tomorrow.”

Fuck. You hadn’t realised how _much_ you’ve missed Karkat, but - tomorrow. _Tomorrow_ , and he’ll be back, and all of you will be together for the first time since this shit started, and maybe you’re all frantically stacking up sandbags rather than being adequately prepared in the first place, but you - you’ll be able to handle this shit, if you have Karkat and Terezi back by your side.

“I gotta help Fef tonight,” Eridan says, but doesn’t match his words with movement. Instead he watches you, waiting for a reaction. “At Eq’s,” he adds at your look of incomprehension. “Where you’re banned from.” He gives you another moment, then rolls his eyes. “Do you want me to fuckin’ pass anythin’ along, or am I talkin’ to a pan-dead rottin’ husk?”

You grab a handful of cereal and start munching on it like grubcorn. “AA and I have a standing bet over who can make you condescendingly explain something simple the best,” you say, and draw your legs up under you to cross them. “Keep going, I’m not sure where EQ’s hive is.”

He gives you a quick sketch of a sneer for that as he stands up and wraps his cape around his shoulders. “You’re lucky I already submitted the concupiscent confirmation, Captor.”

You blink at that, then pull out your palmtop and - yeah, there it is, waiting for your agreement to make sure the two of you are donating together and not pulling a fast one on the drones. Not that it counts for much - the drones do test the slurry to make sure it matches the genetic markers buried in your ident even if they can’t run a full chromosomal panel on the spot, and if it doesn’t match the agreement or if someone’s already submitted with someone else everyone gets culled - but it’s still part of the process.

You tap to confirm the concupiscent link, and carefully do not think at all about your lack of a matesprit as Eridan leaves.

—

For all that you’re enjoying your respite, you still have work to do. Equius, distracted by Vriska, still manages to send you some scans of the blueprints he was working on. You have backups of all the sketches of code bits and pieces, tiny little things to translate movement impulses into various ship functions, keeping the pulses of the ship in line with the Helmsman’s body and providing failsafes if that’s impossible.

There’s a reason you only have bits and pieces of code. Working with biowire is… difficult. You brushed on the difficulties when you and Equius first built Aradia’s body, on deriving inputs from breath and blood and impulses - and sending _output_ , as well. With Aradia, it was simple - you were giving her functionality her brain knew how to process already. The conversation between troll body and unliving ship is another thing entirely. You’ve been tackling it by slapping together microcontrollers for every bundle of nerves that you and Equius have defined as important, but now it’s time to start stitching them together and thinking about the whole.

You pass out in front of your keyboard eighteen hours later, then wake up and take it from the top. Trollian flashes at you - _AA_ , you think, and then turn back to your work; you’ll answer her once you’ve finished this segment-

-you blink, and light is creeping around the edges of your blackout curtains. Trollian is screaming at you, and so is your body. Too tired to catch up on the messages, you send a brief _ii’m fiine, got dii2tracted_ to Aradia to prove that nobody has killed you, send some firmware over to Equius for him to flash on his latest build when he gets a chance, and go collapse in your cupe.

Not enough hours later, you wake up to banging on your door that’s vaguely metallic. _AA_ , you think, bleary, and crawl out of the cupe again to open the door.

Vriska - moulted, adult Vriska, taller than you, put together in clothes that actually fit her, her arm and eye shining and new - looks you up and down sourly. “I ain’t giving you your creds back for the show, Captor.”

You stare at her. Then, slowly, you close the door in her face and lock it. Part of you wants very much to believe that this is just a dream, but even your dreams aren’t this fucked-up. Feeling Aradia’s flesh char to sticky flakes under your hands? Sure. Vriska knocking on your door and getting you fresh out of your cupe like some shitty porn flick? No. You refuse. This is not a world you want to live in.

There’s a more meaty thunk on the door. “Put on some pants and let me in, Sol!”

“What have you done to AA?” you ask through the cheap, thin excuse for a door that’s the only barrier between you and Vriska. She could probably punch it down with her metal arm, and the fact she hasn’t means she still wants something from you. Suspicion unfurls in your chest; Aradia would never have let her come here.

Vriska laughs. “You want me to go into it with all your neighbours listening?” Her voice turns coaxing. “I’m not gonna ruin my free ticket past the drones, dumbass. Go put on some fucking clothes, check on your precious moirail, and then _let me the fuck in_ , Sol. I’m just here to talk.”

You hate Vriska Serket, you think clinically to yourself, your hands shaking. She’s not going to go away, and she’s known the perfect threat to keep you in line from night one. She doesn’t even have to _say_ it, because you both know how too-close she came to making it work, last time.

You go and shrug into the clothes you peeled off before diving into the cupe, then grab your palmtop and go to lean by the door as you check in properly with your moirail.

— twinArmageddons [TA] has started trolling apocalypseArisen [AA] —  
TA: aa an2wer me  
AA: im here!  
AA: which is more than I can say about some other people  
TA: yeah ii’m 2orry. but what the fuck ii2 vk doiing out2iide my door.  
TA: what diid 2he do.  
AA: nothing in the way of things id expect from vriska  
AA: karkat got here and then slapped her upside the head and told her to sort out her shit  
TA: what.  
AA: vriska and i might have broken some things  
TA: diid kk fuckiing au2pii2tiicii2e for you.  
AA: i think so?

You close your eyes and mouth a silent prayer of thanks to your best friend. Next time he makes you want to blow up his husktop, you’re going to be incredibly magnanimous and abstain.

TA: but why ii2 2he OUT2IIDE MY DOOR.  
AA: well i tried to go after her but karkat sat on me  
AA: its probably better if i dont give her the opportunity to pull shit with you and me anyway  
AA: i mean be careful but i dont think she actually wants to brutally murder either of us  
TA: iincrediible.

You shove your palmtop into your pocket, ignore the way the fabric of your shirt is already sticking to you since you didn’t bother to even wipe yourself down, then rest a hand on the door. You cannot fucking believe you’re doing this.

When you open the door, Vriska gives you the same once-over before shrugging and sliding her way inside. She takes your chair and spins in it before you even have the door shut, and you sigh to yourself. Before the coup goes down, before you either die or Ascend, you are going to have someone in your hive and _you are going to use your own damn computer chair._

“So,” Vriska says, drawing it out. Her sing-song tone is directly at odds with her flat, level gaze, and you wish you’d had more than ten minutes out of the cupe before having to deal with her. You wait, because the one thing you’ve learned about Vriska Serket in this whole ordeal is to not take the bait. Finally, abruptly, she says, “I appreciate the work you’ve been doing for me.”

You stare at her, because obviously this cannot be Vriska and this is your first contact with an alien race.

Vriska leans forward, creating an intimate space, inviting you to conspiracy. “Look,” she says, and you can tell you’re not going to like what comes next. “I know the chance of you trusting me is shit-all, but I have a proposition for you.” When you continue to say nothing, she says, “We’ve been working together with this scouting-out-ships thing and neither of us has fucked the other over, right? And Megido and I have been together for a while now, and even you have to admit I ain’t put a toe out of line.” She shrugs. “And I saved your fucking revolution a couple times, too.”

“What do you want?” you finally say, your voice flat.

She looks up at you, gauging your reaction. “I want my fucking life back.”

Well. You hadn’t expected her to come right out and say it, although she’s wheedled around it enough. All this _freedom_ , all this _I’m still paying for something I did when I was six sweeps old_ , here’s the culmination. You have your worst enemy in front of you, and she’s laid herself bare - and you don’t think she’s even realised. Vriska likes to pretend her weaknesses don’t hurt her, that she’s acting her way through them.

“Aradia trusts me,” she says, and shrugs a shoulder. “Enough, anyway. There’s no forgiveness for what I did, fine, whatever. I’m a part of this fucking group whether I try to be or not, so I might as well be treated like it.” She folds her arms and leans back. “So can you cool your shit if I start hanging around, or what?”

You grab her by the throat. It’s such an instinctual lashing-out that, at first, you don’t know if you’ve done it by hands or psionics, but then you lift her into the air and power arcs between you. She starts clawing back at you almost immediately, her hands coming within centimetres of your face and a foot nearly catching you in the ribs. For a moment, your hand jerks and your power lessens and you panic beneath your fury because you’ve felt this cold touch in your head before - but then Vriska grits out a, “Fine,” and your control slams back into place.

“Fucking kill me then, Captor,” she says through her teeth, hands grasping futilely at the rings of red and blue around her neck. “Just fucking _end it_.”

You stare at her, then dump her on her ass. She - she had you. You know what it feels like to snatch your power back, and that wasn’t it. She could have saved her own neck and gone on another murder spree, but she _let you go_.

She stares back at you, chest heaving, wariness and resentment plain on her face.

“Fuck you,” you say, your voice rising into a screech. “ _Fuck you!_ You - you fucking think you can waltz back in after a couple of sweeps and call it over when _AA was fucking crumbling in my fucking hands_ , Vriska?”

“You-” she snaps, then stops and bites her tongue. Literally, you see her jaw move. “Fine,” she says, freezing cold. “Keep fucking Eridan, keep getting between Terezi and the rest of the world. I guess ignoring the crimes of dumb kids works a lot better for you as long as you don’t have to deal with it _personally_ , right, Captor?” She stands up, dusts herself off unnecessarily. “I didn’t even want forgiveness. Just a fucking truce. But I have shit to do, and business with Aradia, and you still fucking owe me, so now you get to fucking deal with me whether you like it or not.”

She gives you one last venomous look and sweeps out, while you’re still shaking with the effort of not killing her and being done with it.

—

It takes a long time for you to cool down enough that ‘agitated’ is a better descriptor for you than ‘rageful’. You do manage to warn Aradia that you pissed Vriska off, then very nearly get in a fight over how blithely she takes the warning. It takes you forcibly putting your palmtop down and sitting in the furthest corner of your tiny, shitty nutritionblock with your hands buried in your hair for half an hour before you can breathe normally, let alone think.

You almost killed Vriska. You don’t- you know how powerful you are, how easy it’d be to make any problem just go away. It’s because you know that, and because you have seen Terezi staring bitterly at nothing, and because Aradia was nearly nothing but a chunk of burnt, unrecognisable meat, that you have never murdered anyone. You’ve hurt people, but only with warning, and only enough for you to be able to get out of the situation.

You would have kept squeezing until Vriska’s head was sliced off her shoulders, if she hadn’t given up. She - she had to know that. If she’d thought there was any risk to her, she wouldn’t have gone through with it.

_Breathe_.

You need- someone else’s opinion. More data. Not Terezi, not Aradia, because the ties between them all - and you - are what’s tripping you up. Someone peripheral, but still hurt, who can tell you if you’re being unreasonable or not.

You go scoop your palmtop off your desk and sit back in your corner, shoving yourself up against the walls like they’ll actually shield you from anything.

— twinArmageddons [TA] has started trolling grimAuxiliatrix [GA] —  
TA: kn ii need help  
GA: Does It Ever Occur To You That Perhaps I Am Sick Of Always Being The Help  
TA: hey wow great another fuckiing argument  
TA: iit’2 about vk 2o iif you could ju2t hold back the 2narky hor2e2hiit untiil ii can fiigure out a way two not burn our clade2 two the fuckiing ground that would be amaziing  
GA: Oh Yes Just What I Have Always Desired More Of My Life Revolving Around Vriska  
TA: don’t get me wrong ii’m iincrediibly happy that you found your pa22iive aggre22iive 2piine but you are liiterally the only per2on who miight be able two 2top u2 all from gettiing kiilled 2o  
TA: are you goiing two help me out or not  
GA: What Could I Possibly Help You With  
GA: What Do You Want To Know  
GA: Vriska Is A Pitiful Wreck Of A Troll Who Wears Her Bloodpump On Her Sleeve And Engages In Delusion And Lies Through Her Teeth In Order To Preserve Herself Above All Else  
GA: There Congratulations You Now Know Exactly As Much About Vriska Serket As I Do  
TA: 2he triied two call a fuckiing truce wiith me  
GA: Who Cares   
GA: Im So Tired Of This Petty Emotional Battlefield  
GA: She Went After Tavros Aradia Went After Her She Hurt Aradia Terezi Hurt Her She Hurt Them Both You Hurt Her  
GA: Im Done Fixing Things  
GA: Fix It Yourself  
GA: Maybe Youll Learn Something  
— grimAuxiliatrix [GA] ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —

You rub a hand over your face and stare at the conversation. There’s your answer, you guess, Kanaya actually being helpful even if she bit your head off in the process. Vriska lies through her teeth. You’re pretty sure they’re at least somewhat of a flushed thing, by process of elimination, and this is what the person who knows her best and kindest has to say about her.

_She wears her heart on her sleeve_.

Maybe she does. Maybe Vriska _does_ want her life back. Fuck, you want _your_ life back, before you knew what it was like to cut up another troll, before you had to stitch your moirail up with artificial flesh and helming techniques. None of you can get that back, though, and Vriska doesn’t seem to get that. She doesn’t get that it’s _because of her actions_. She was the one who fucked it all up in the first place, gleefully and unrepentantly.

She let you go. By all appearances, she was happy to let you kill her.

You grind your hands into your eyes, curl your knees up tighter to your chest, and think of nothing but how much easier life would be right now if you could have just slept in again.

—

You can’t avoid your life forever, even if you really want to. Ascension and the Battleship Condescension loom ever closer, and you need at least a proof of concept for the helmsrig. You go back to Equius’ hive once you manage to wash all the dried sopor out of your hair and find some clothes that aren’t soaked in sopor.

Aradia, Feferi, and Eridan aren’t there. Equius is, and so is Nepeta for once, swinging her feet as she sits on a bench and watches him work. At your usual bench, however, are Karkat and Terezi, muttering fiercely to each other as Karkat scribbles on a sheet of paper.

You make a pained noise in the back of your throat at the sight of them, involuntarily. You didn’t think it was that loud, but everyone immediately looks up at you. Next thing you know, you’re staggering from Karkat’s impact, his arms locked around your ribs hard enough that you can hardly breathe.

You don’t fucking care.

You wrap your arms around him and press your face into his stupid, unruly hair and feel his dumb tiny horns dig into your cheekbones and it’s real, he’s _real_ , even if he is too thin and in weird clothes and hardly the Karkat you used to know. None of you can get the lives you had back, but you can damn fucking well pick who you want by your side in this mess, and Karkat is an anchor.

“I thought I escaped the emotions,” Terezi says, disgruntled. Her voice is lower than it used to be, and there’s less of a hidden laugh in it. You look at her over Karkat’s head and she grins at you, all teeth still. “I’ll allow it. Exceptional circumstances, Appleberry.”

“What are you doing _here_?” you finally ask. “Where’s your _fucking army_?”

Karkat pulls away and you let him go, dragging a chair over with your psionics so you can sit at your own bench. Well, Equius’ bench, but it’s _yours_. This people-taking-over-your-space thing needs to stop. “Well,” he says, drawing it out with relish. “There wasn’t any space for my _fucking army_ anywhere else, so we made an executive decision and stowed them underground.”

“Underground,” you echo, dumbly. Then it hits you. “You got KN to put them in _the fucking brooding caverns?_ ” No wonder she was so pissed off. That space - it’s practically sacred to the Empire, and jadebloods have always been its guardians. “Was that a good idea?”

Karkat rolls his eyes. “It was the only idea we had, unless you wanted to cosy up with ten other unwashed nerds in every block of your hivestem. Feferi and Aradia are over there now, anyway, holding the fort. You may be surprised to learn, Captor, that I am not dense enough to rip a hole in the fabric of spacetime. I am aware Kanaya is upset.”

Terezi groans a heartfelt groan and sprawls over your bench, papers there notwithstanding. “Appleberry-”

You wave a hand. “Not the advice guy.”

Karkat sighs. “I’m going to have to do something, I _know_ ,” he says in the direction of Terezi’s shoulder. “She’s sort of a guarantor for a lot of the mutants we picked up,” he tells you, expression more reserved than you’ve ever seen on his face. “The brooding caverns standards, and everything.”

Terezi links her hands over her ribs. “What our master of public relations is failing to tell you is that he and Kanaya slept together and she locked herself in the ablutionsblock afterwards, and has refused to talk to him since. I find that I am rather losing my taste for being a mediator after enduring two solid weeks of ‘Ask Karkat to pass the grubjelly.’”

Karkat throws himself back in his chair. “I fucked up! I fucked up extravagantly and entirely expectedly!” This is clearly a rehashing of an old argument, but you’re finding out more about their side of things in this one conversation than any stolen moments on Trollian. “I am _aware_ of this, and I have tried crawling in abjectly on my knees to beg forgiveness for everything I have inflicted upon her person, in case you hadn’t noticed in your perfect fucking mediatorship, and the ball is solidly on her side of the delineated playing field!”

“Cherrybomb, you are one of my oldest and dearest friends,” Terezi says to the ceiling, and Karkat colours, “but I have to inform you, you don’t do ‘abject apologies’ very well.” No more kindly, she adds, “What you excel at is beating your head against a brick wall. You may be able to make up for one with the other.”

Karkat huffs. “ _Anyway_ , we need to figure out what happens next. With everything, not just my miserable fuckery of a personal life. Where are you at with the helm, Sollux?”

You shoo Terezi off your bench and wave Equius over. He’s been politely ignoring you since Karkat nearly broke your ribs, talking quietly to Nepeta as he pieces something together. Nepeta waves to the rest of you and jogs upstairs, supremely unconcerned about anything surrounding the future of the Alternian Empire.

“How’d you go with things while I was gone?” you ask him, as you begin laying out the latest blueprints. He’s been at them, you see, several key points amended since you last poured over them all with pens in hand.

There’s nothing to fix.

Well, there’s plenty you could do. You could spend sweeps paring down what you have, rerouting and finessing connections. But as you trace a finger over the page, following dense bundles of wires, every single necessary relay seems to be in place. All the microcontrollers you’ve put together, too, the ones that’ll handle translating from biowire to nervous system, are in the places you wanted them to be - had you told him? You remember a couple of incidents of spamming messages at him on Trollian while you were in the middle of your coding bender, maybe you did tell him what to do. You can’t believe he had the _time_ to, though.

Equius coughs, then carefully wipes away a sheen of sweat when you, Terezi, and Karkat all look up at him. “I, ah- I have taken the liberty of putting together a prototype.”

You feel one of your eyebrows rising, so you take off your glasses slowly to complete the look of utter incredulity. “You did what.”

“The last pieces were the microcontrollers you were working on,” he says, uncertainly. “Unless there were sections I was uninformed of.” He gestures to the far corner of the room, where a tangle of wire hangs. There’s enough robot detritus in the lab that your eyes just skipped over it, but when you stand up and walk over to inspect it, it’s… the rig.

Fuck. You’ve seen it all drawn out, of course, and in bits and pieces, but you had no idea how close all those bits were to making a whole. You bury your fingers in the myriad of wires, rub your fingers along the sharp prongs, find where the biowire of the ship is made to connect with the carefully-applied biowire you salvaged.

“How’d you make this with Vriska hanging around?” you ask, absent, as you dig up a multimeter. Equius probably did all the testing he could do, but you’re a psionic.

He hands you a pair of leads and then coaxes out the first of hundreds of connectors for you to test. “Carefully.”

Karkat and Terezi watch silently as you work your way through the rig, Karkat standing aggressively at rest and Terezi with her hands wrapped around the head of her cane. It takes you an hour and three patch-ups, all in all, and when you’re done you’re so dizzy that you collapse into a chair Terezi pushes into the back of your knees.

“So?” Karkat asks, when it becomes obvious that nobody else will.

You rub your face with both hands, a headache forming a storm front in the back of your skull. “It- it fucking _works_ , I guess, it’s routing things properly but fuck knows if it’ll actually work until we can put someone in it.”

The look Terezi and Karkat share over your head threatens to drown you.

“We’re going to have to put someone in it,” you say, resigned.

“Maybe not.” Karkat’s voice is also resigned, the tone of a man who is going to exhaust every possibility even when it’s obvious that only the one nobody likes is going to work. “Fuck, most of the psionics we collected think helming’s some kind of bullshit spun to keep ‘em scared. Feferi making sure they don’t disappear is good enough for them.”

“Whatever,” you sigh, and look at your hands. You _like_ your hands, now. You hadn’t realised how attached you’d get to them until someone promised you that you wouldn’t have to mutilate them. At least future generations will be less mutilated; the first attempt at something is rarely pretty. “FF’s going to need proof that it works. We can test it on me.”

“No.” Equius nearly shouts it, which snaps your attention away from your hands. You expected him to protest, sure. You expect a whole lot of people to protest. What you hadn’t expected was the _shout;_ Equius hasn’t raised his voice since you last fought and managed to come to an uneasy peace. He keeps his temper in check, because he’s bone-deep afraid of the damage he could do. “I will _not_ -” He sees everyone staring at him and goes an unhealthy, blotchy blue. “Captor, you are one of two people in the world who understands this- this procedure. The risk is unacceptable.”

“Don’t,” you say, quiet and level and cold, “tell me what to do with myself, Zahhak.”

He draws himself up, haughty blueblood. “I will not facilitate this unthinking selfishness.”

“He has a point.” Terezi rocks on her heels, her cane a fulcrum keeping her from falling. “You’ve made yourself too useful, Appleberry!” While you’re trying to marshal a response around the headache that’s gotten all the way to your teeth, she ruffles your hair condescendingly. “Karkat and I will be able to find a volunteer, as necessary. Focus on helping Feferi.”

Equius inclines his head to her. Shallowly, but the fact that he does it at all is something. “When will the Heiress be returning?”

“Hey-” you protest, at the conversation moving along without your input.

Karkat places a hand on your shoulder and squeezes. “You can shut your self-sacrificial mouth and put your phalanges to something more useful. The rig is done except for suffocating some poor fuck in it?” At your sullen nod, he says, “Good. Let’s use it to fuck up any plans Her Condescension had of keeping this quiet.”

Well. You can’t argue with that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Couple of announcements!
> 
> 1\. This is the **last nice chapter**. I have spent 100 000 words building this up and now I am about to engage in sweet, sweet payoff and spend the rest of the fic kicking it down. For those of you who can't deal with terrible things happening to your babies, now is the time to close the tab and blissfully pretend that this fic has a happy ending. Sollux and Equius end up married administrators of the Helmsmen Corps and improbably raise three grubs. You're welcome.
> 
> 2\. The fic has a tumblr! [Here is the tumblr](http://www.onextendedvacation.tumblr.com), where you may poke me at will about the OLOH world. Also, [I have a tumblr](http://www.ashkatom.tumblr.com), which I only just realised many of you may not know of, so have a notice.
> 
> That is everything! Thank you for sticking with me this far, and for those of you continuing on with me, let's have some _fun_.


	24. Chapter 24

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Final warning: TERRIBLE THINGS HAPPEN IN THIS CHAPTER ONWARDS. THIS IS NOT A HAPPY FIC. STOP READING NOW IF YOU BELIEVE YOU WILL BE HURT.

The Helmsrig project is over. You’d spend some time unsure of what to do with your life if you had your way, but Aradia ends up towing you back to Equius’ hive of an evening regardless, and from there you get laden up with books (from Eridan, entirely too smug at not being culled on concupiscent grounds), schemes (from Karkat, also disgustingly smug about Eridan’s survival), robot repairs (Feferi), Helming questions (Aradia), and a vague feeling of unease that comes with having to trust in the competence of others (Terezi).

_How long?_ they all ask with their eyes, every time they see you so much as glance at your palmtop. In the end, you get fed up and write _30_ on one of Equius’ whiteboards in giant red letters, then outline the whole thing in blue. It’s pulled out of your ass, but it’s no less reasonable than any other guess. When you come in the next night, before anyone can harry you into showing up regardless, it’s been replaced with a _29_ in Equius’ square, precise hand, and you guess it’s your official timeline.

You do what you can. Now that you’re not frantically clawing your way through Helming procedures in order to come up with something that could actually work, you’re free to focus more on your own projects, which you create with a vengeance. You spend three nights carefully hiding Equius’ hive from the Alternian network, building in redirects and firewalls and relays, and then start barraging the Empire with every last scrap of Feferi and Karkat that you can scrounge up.

Karkat is easy enough to barrage people with, given he’s a one-man battering ram. You wish you could get some footage of him and his _fucking army_ in the brooding caverns, but you neither want to give away the army’s size or location. Instead, you have a stilted, civil conversation with Kanaya, she sends you everything she - as the only one of the group with any common sense - recorded of Karkat’s horrifically earnest speeches, and you go from there.

Feferi is harder. In the end, you introduce the Empire to Feferi as a person, contrasted against the aloof spectre that is the Empress. You give them every kind, anarchist bone in Feferi’s body. _Too young,_ is the first response, when people see her unmoulted and weigh her against the law of nature that is Her Condescension. You follow the small, secretive discussions that take place in obscure memos and spend sleepless days making sure that the universe _knows_ about Feferi Peixes.

You almost don’t ask her, before taking the next step and fucking up the Empire irrevocably. Then you shove the keyboard away, blink for what feels like the first time in hours, and think about what you’re trying to do. You can’t do this, snatch away control and run the revolution for her, and make her deal with the Empire’s consequences coming down on her without her actively choosing it. You’re trying to give choice back, not take it away. So you call her over, and talk her through the detail, and wait as she processes what you’ve told her.

Her hand goes tight on her culling fork, and her face goes stern, and all she says is, “Do it.”

“It’s going to destroy the Empire, even if you don’t win,” you drive home, gauging her reaction. The entire room is still and silent, everyone holding their breath as they watch the two of you.

To your surprise, she flashes you a quick, sideways smile, the hand on her culling fork relaxing. “Good.”

Feferi Peixes is terrifying.

She watches as you tear the Empire down. It’s simpler an act than it should be; just sharing a single archive file in several of the discussions you’ve wormed your way into. Three folders. One contains the bloody reality of Helming, one contains a very clean copy of your rig blueprints, a somewhat-organised copy of all of your notes, and a video that consists of you testing the rig while Equius, off-camera, explains what’s happening, and the last folder contains every single Helmsman personnel file that you could dig up - which is, sadly, not a lot. You had to crawl through layers of security and obscurity for sweeps to find out everything you did about Helming, after you pieced together just enough to keep Aradia breathing, and everything you’ve gathered still has holes in it the size of the planet. The system is designed to make trolls like you disappear, turn you into insensate tools and use you for the good of the Empire and minimise the obstacles to getting their money’s worth out of you.

Feferi has to leave to visit the brooding caverns, before your results start trickling in. Aradia goes with her, and you curl up in your chair with a blanket and watch as the Fleet loses its shit. There are attempts to block the distribution of your files, but you’ve set up relays and failsafes and this information _cannot_ be suppressed, not now. The network is too decentralised by design to shut it down from the outside.

The chatter in the room around you dies out as people start trickling back to their hives, and you barely notice, caught up in watching the numbers tick over.

\--

People start dying a couple hours after sunrise.

If there’s one thing you’ve pulled apart in this entire venture, it’s the way you’ve all been subtly moulded to accept the status quo. The haemospectrum is the least of it, even with all the ways you had to break through that particular barrier with Equius. There was Karkat’s bleak fury, the way he was going to throw himself away because he knew he was dead regardless. Tavros, and the way he couldn’t run far and fast enough because it was all he _could_ do. You, and your belief that being a battery was all you could hope for. Aradia and Terezi and Vriska, forced into a revenge cycle by their ideals. The Empire builds you all pedestals and expects you to balance on them perfectly, and has built that expectation into all of you from the ground up.

A lot - a _lot_ \- of the Empire doesn’t care about the unpalatable truth you’ve revealed. _Who cares_ and _whatever_ and _it’s just another job_ and _someone has to do it_. There’s enough, though, who have lost a moirail, a matesprit, a kismesis; enough who got the airtight notices and false missives and never quite believed it, enough whose wounds never really scabbed over. You watch every discussion you can and set up keyword notifications for the ones you can’t, chewing your lip as the notifications overwhelm you. They all follow the same script, anyway. _I’m gonna go look,_ resounding silence, _um what happened, I’m gonna go look come with me_ , trollhandles turning grey as deaths are reported, then _oh fuck_ and a torrential spam of pictures of a Helmsblock, and the bodies in the core.

You work as quickly as you can, hack together a script that starts uploading the pictures elsewhere, hiding them in remote corners where they can be pulled back out at need. You can’t stop this from happening, take it back and give the trolls fighting through to their Helmsblocks against Imperial will and Imperial loyalty back their lives, but you _can_ make sure that people get to see why they did what they did.

To your surprise, Equius pulls up a chair next to you as the day wears on. He doesn’t say anything, just watches the text scroll in the thousand windows you have open across as many monitors as you could commandeer. Usually someone looking over your shoulder is irritating at best, but you’re too tired to care, and nothing really needs your direct intervention anymore. There are people looking for you, but every attempt drowns them in a sea of false positives, and the Fleet has more important things to worry about than where all this started.

You wrap the blanket more tightly around yourself, too exhausted to care about Equius’ reactions to the latest step of the revolution. “Going to chew me out?”

Equius laughs, which makes you whip your head around and stare. It’s not much of a laugh - just a quick, shapeless noise of amusement - but to be honest, you figured he was constitutionally incapable of it. “Perhaps, if I cared to make you more stubborn than usual.” He smiles, but it’s an approximation of a smile, and not rooted in any positive emotion. “I… wished to see the results.”

You work a hand free of your blanket and gesture at the screens in front of the two of you. He gets paler with every memo he scans through, and you get to watch as he realises there are more of them than any one troll could get through in a lifetime. Helmsman after Helmsman is being exposed, and the Empire is never going to be the same.

“This is-” he says, hoarse.

You wait for the rest of it, but it never comes. Eventually, you reach over and pry his hand off the directional input device before he can destroy it. “I’m watching,” you say, as neutrally as you can. “Making sure it doesn’t get out of hand.”

“Out of hand,” he echoes, but reclines back in his seat - as much as you’ve ever seen him recline, anyway. “These- there are _riots_ in the most fragile areas of the Empire.”

It has been far too long since you last left the sweet embrace of sopor for you to work up any energy for a good argument. Instead, you just shrug a shoulder. “Riots end. Helming doesn’t.”

An awkward silence conquers the room after that remark. You should be used to it by now, but - not really? As of late you and Equius have managed to master the comfortable silence, given the time you’ve spent in close proximity. More than once in the past week you have made eye contact through your respective eyewear and shared a silent wish for the days before the entire revolution existed in your personal bubbles.

You huddle further down into your blanket while he processes that, pull your legs up against your chest so your feet stop freezing. It’s not like you could sleep, so you might as well settle into watching everything play out. After a few more minutes of Equius not saying anything, you groan a little, mentally, because you’re sick of running into this wall every time. “Did you really think this was going to happen smoothly?” you ask, too tired to not be blunt. “I told you back when we started this. If the Empire wanted free Helmsmen, it’d have free Helmsmen already.”

Equius rubs his face, dislodging his glasses, and you realise then that it’s probably somewhere around midday and he doesn’t have a sleep schedule as gloriously fucked up as yours is. After a moment, he straightens back up to his usual posture, which somehow manages to be straight-backed and slump-shouldered at the same time. “I was aware it was foolish,” he says, “but I had hoped.”

You keep your attention on the scrolling text in front of you, doing your best to keep the situation as free of awkwardness as possible. This conversation is somewhat more serious than your usual fare of ‘hand me the thing’. “Yeah, well,” you mutter. “Sorry for our lowblooded outrage, EQ.”

“Captor,” he says, patient but warning. You grunt an acknowledgement that that was kind of a cheap shot and work a hand free of your blanket to prod a script that stopped working back into action. “I will have to ask you to leave, tonight,” he says a few minutes later.

You direct your gaze upwards beseechingly. “I _get it_ , everyone’s dying, it’s fucking horrifying and you made it happen through trying to make things better and you abhor violence and fuck knows what other issues. I have been awake for _fuck knows how long_ and I _snapped_.”

Normally, you’d probably get some freezing blueblooded indignity back. This time you get a mortified look, which is at least a new thing to tick off on the Equius Zahhak Field Guide. “I-” he says, then swallows. He blushes way too easily for someone who gets embarrassed so often. “I expect to begin moulting.”

“Oh,” you say, strangled. Fuck, _you_ blush too easily for someone who habitually eats his own foot.

Equius looks away, reaches over to the computer to bring another window into focus. “I was. Unaware that you were paying so much attention to my motives.”

“Yeah, well.” You lean in to look at the window he’s brought up. Looks like the Court has started issuing statements on this attack on the Fleet. You’ve always wanted to be a terrorist, and it seems your wish has been granted. “It’s not like I’m ecstatic about this either.”

—

Moulting is fucking _bullshit_. You’ve known that since you moulted, but you had honestly thought that it couldn’t get much worse than your case. Somehow, though, what it has led to everyone crammed into _your_ tiny excuse for a hive, since Equius’ is currently a no-fly zone. You don’t know why everyone decided on invading _your_ hivestem, since literally everyone else has actual hives and therefore more than a few inches of personal space when more than one guest descends on them, but apparently you’re more _central_.

This may be the first time in your short, pathetic life you have actually felt apologetic towards your neighbours.

At least you have kept control of your computer chair, although it’s only because you booted Karkat out of it instead of typing over his shoulders. He and Feferi are jostling at your elbows while you try to figure out how fast the Battleship Condescension is travelling. It’s passed by a couple of relays now, and the switchover log can give you at least a vague idea of what your actual deadline will be.

The ship hasn’t sped up in the slightest since you dropped the Helmsman bomb. It worries you more than if they _had_ ; the ‘stomp the dissenters out’ reaction is a perfectly understandable one, given the circumstances. After checking the variables a couple times just to make sure, you shrug at them. “It was a good guess.”

“Twenty-four nights,” Karkat says, vaguely stunned. “Fuck.”

Twenty-four nights. You still haven’t gotten used to _this_ status quo and then it’s all going to get fucked up again just when you are.

“We need to decide what happens next,” Feferi says, more somber than someone as naturally bubbly as Feferi should be. “We’ve come too far just for everyfin to settle back down if I lose the fight.”

None of you say anything, because for all you’ve talked about it, the cold reality is settling in. People have died - are still dying - Fleet-side, and you’re about to lead more into their deaths, if everything goes wrong. You’ll be the first ones chained to the flogging jut, if Feferi doesn’t put a culling fork through her Condescension.

Feferi clasps her hands together, one thumb nervously rubbing along the other, and turns to include Kanaya, Aradia, and Terezi in her words. You and Karkat turn too, so none of you have to crane your necks. “I want to take away Condesce’s power,” she says, slowly, to the four of you. “We’ve already done a lot to make sure that the Empire can’t continue as it was, with the detachable helmsrig. But it’s naut enough, if I die.”

Kanaya - who is glowing a sickly green, less than thrilled to be dragged out of the brooding caverns, and hasn’t looked once at Karkat despite the close confines of your living quarters making that a near-impossible task - frowns. “Anything you do to weaken Condesce’s hold over the Empire will lessen your own hold, in turn.”

Feferi nods. “Eridan and I were up late trying to figure out a way to phase power out gracefully, halibut it all comes back to one fin, with power in the Empire.” She presses her lips together, a brief flash of emotion too complicated to name. “Gl’bgolyb.” Karkat reaches over and places a hand on her shoulder, and she lets her own hands free of their white-knuckled grip to squeeze his hand before continuing. “If we leave Gl’bgolyb alive much longer, Condesce could decide to end this the easy way and krill everyone on-planet. I don’t know how she’ll try to fix this, halibut I’d rather naut find out the hard way.”

“You’ll need me and Sollux,” Aradia says, considering. It’s a big idea to have to consider, and you’ve had a while to consider it, while Feferi was working through it. “You might need every psionic in the army.”

“No.” Feferi takes a deep, fortifying breath. “Just you and Sollux. I can- I can do the rest.”

“And if you _can’t_?” Aradia presses.

“Then it won’t make much difference.” Feferi approximates a smile. “And it won’t be our problem.”

Karkat snorts. “No wonder Eridan didn’t want to come to this meeting of Coup Club. I can’t believe _I’m_ the kind of pan-rotten shitlord attending this fucking meeting of Coup Club.”

“We were combing through everything looking for times Gl’bgolyb krilled people pretty late.” Feferi’s smile is a little more real this time, and her shift back into something more troll-like means you finally notice the dark smudges of exhaustion under her eyes with a stab of guilt. It’s… an academic possibility for you, having a hand in killing Gl’bgolyb, but not for her. “I messaged him when I left, but I fin he was still sleeping.” Her smile fades a little, again. “Betides. I don’t fin this is an easy subject for him.”

“If we don’t get to run away screaming, neither does he,” Karkat says, and taps out a brief message on his palmtop. Then he frowns. “No reply. Hasn’t he learned to function on three minutes of sleep like a civilised damned troll?”

You seize the chance. There are too many people here, leaving you hemmed-in and thin screaming trapped behind your ribs. You like these people, absolutely - you wouldn’t have overthrown the Empire with them otherwise - but your hivestem has exactly the right amount of space for you and you alone, and it’s starting to feel like you can’t breathe. “I’ll go kick him awake,” you say, brusque, and shove open your window. Karkat immediately steals your chair, the opportunistic fucker. “At his or your hive, FF?”

“His,” she supplies, looking between Karkat and Kanaya with an alarmingly determined expression. More reason for you to leave. “Take your time.”

—

It takes a while to get out to the shore where Eridan lives, since nobody is insane enough to think a lowblood hivestem should be built near an ocean, but you count it as time spent not having to deal with the mess that is Kanaya and Karkat in the same room. Aradia’s always been better at that sort of thing, anyway. The miles of scrub between your hives falls away without incident until you can see the wide strip of sand that lazily cuts its way between grass and ocean.

You correct your course to take you along the shore to Eridan’s hive, and twenty minutes later his wreck is more than a blob on the horizon. Something shimmers oddly by the water - it’s too cold for a mirage, so it has to be something he’s done, and relief from a worry you didn’t know was gnawing at you floods you as you push your powers that little bit further, slice faster through the cold, thin air. He’s probably already seen the messages Feferi and Karkat left for him, which makes your trip out here useless, but at least you’ll have the joy of snarking at him on the journey back.

Whatever made the shimmer is gone by the time you land, so you walk the rest of the way to the ship over the wet sand rubbing your arms in a vain attempt to warm back up. “ED!” you yell, as you climb into the ship. You’ve been here once or twice, but sweeps ago, and you don’t remember much of it. You don’t even know where his block is - you never made it past waiting around in the communal block while Karkat dragged him out.

You don’t make it past there now, because you walk in and he’s sprawled on the floor, one more splash of ostentatious purple in the room.

“ED,” you say, dumbly. Part of you knows - of fucking _course_ it does, because this lost the sheen of plausible deniability the night Vriska took over your mind and made you her weapon - but the rest of you has to make sure. So you cross over to where he lies, glance around cautiously while you press one hand to his stone-cold cheek.

There’s no rise and fall of his chest, no twitch of an eyelid or fin. His hair lies mussed against the floor, and his expression is too peaceful to match any he had in life. You back away, because you are suddenly overwhelmed by how this cannot be Eridan. You knew Eridan, and he isn’t here.

“Fuck you,” you tell him, and sink down to sit against the wall. There’s no way this is some random strike back at him from one of the kids whose lusii he killed, and you start laughing bitterly at what that means because there’s nothing else left to do. You thought you were so fucking clever, outwitting the Fleet as you brought the Helmsman system crashing down, but Condesce must have known. She would have known about Karkat - 90% of the fucking Fleet knows about Karkat, you made sure of it - and she would have known about Feferi, and it wouldn’t have been too hard to trace the contours of their lives, find the intersection that was blowing-the-roof-off-the-aptitude-tests you. Eridan is - _was_ a logical strike back, to deter all of you.

Of course she’d have her own agents here. _Of fucking course_ she would, you can’t believe you didn’t think of it before-

You want to scream. You want to howl your rage to the sky and burn the Fleet out of existence. But you can’t, and it wouldn’t do any good, and you always knew you’d be death to those you love, so instead you calmly grab your palmtop and send a brief message to Karkat, telling him that Eridan Ampora is the first casualty of your revolution.

—

You get a little disjointed, after that. Aradia wraps her arms around you and buries your face in her shoulder long enough for your walls to crack a little. The feel of metal pressing into your forehead highlights the stark reality of how bad you are for your quadrants, and she rocks on her heels a little as she shushes you through your first tirade on how well you’ve managed to fuck everything up, hiding you away in a block of Eridan’s hive that you’d never seen before.

“You didn’t kill him,” she tells you, once you’ve managed to cram the panicked, loathing voice away, and strokes careful circles around your horn. You want to yell at her - wasn’t she _listening_? - but she shushes you pre-emptively. “You didn’t paint a target on his back any bigger than the one on your own, Sollux. He did this knowing the risks. Don’t take that from him.”

You nod, jerky, then dry your eyes and shove your glasses back on hard enough that the bridge of your nose throbs. Grief. Fine, whatever; there are things that aren’t weeping into your moirail’s shoulder that need doing. You can break to pieces over this once you’re not needed anymore. Aradia takes your hand, making you feel sick to your stomach, but you’re too grateful for the anchor to reality to let go.

“Is he-” you ask before you leave the privacy of the block she sequestered you in.

She shakes her head.

You’re never going to forget the look on Karkat’s face when he first came in and found you sitting beside Eridan’s corpse, heartbreak and horror written across his features. Aradia pulled you away, but you heard him escalate ‘ _no_ ’s of disbelief, the wailing cutting through every wall in the hive. He looks up when you and Aradia walk in, that look still there and barely subdued. He immediately holds out a hand with a hastily-splinted finger to you, and you hug him even though you feel like acid because he needs it more than you need to leave and hide in the darkest corner Alternia has to offer.

He doesn’t cry, having just fought himself back into composure. You know the feeling.

“What are we,” he says, hoarsely, before stopping to clear his throat. “The body.”

Feferi lays a hand on his shoulder and meets your eyes. “I’ll take care of it.”

You nod, because speaking would cut you open. Karkat nods a bare moment after. Leaving Eridan to the sea is either sick or fitting, considering his life, but Feferi was his moirail, once. People change, but you think she probably would have known what was most right. Besides, from the terrible depth in the way she meets your eyes, you think you’re not the only one feeling guilty.

She picks him - his corpse up carefully, without apparent exertion, and at that point you have to turn away. You start tearing through the block as Feferi leaves, unable to watch them go, and after a moment Karkat joins you. “He wasn’t wearing his scarf,” Karkat says, voice still hoarse to the point you think he might have hurt his throat.

You shrug, continue looking for anything out of place. “No cape, either. This is his fucking hive, so what?”

Karkat shakes his head. “He always wears the scarf. His neck gills are - were - fucked up, they got cold.” He picks an extravagant cup off a side table, then puts it back down, helplessly. “The fuck are we even doing? Trying to solve a murder? Congratulations, assholes, you win, here’s the fucksponge that murdered him! He’s still dead, by the by, hope you didn’t lift your hope glands out of your bile sacks!”

Your hands ball into fists of their own accord. “At least we’d fucking- do something, I don’t know, what do you fucking want from me, KK?”

Aradia slides between the two of you, taking your hand and rubbing soothing circles into it, laying an arm carefully over Karkat’s shoulders. You both crumple at about the same time, defeat in every line of your bodies even if you’re beyond crying. “Let’s go,” she says, softly. “The best thing you can do is pull yourselves together and keep working.”

You nod. Karkat nods. Aradia gently leads you away from all that remains in the world of your kismesis, and you feel yourself grow more numb by the step.

—

You wind up in the brooding caverns somehow. You think you might have been involved - remember the words _know who we are_ coming off your tongue - but you pass out in the block Kanaya claimed as her own as soon as a sopor patch hits your arm, with hopes that things will feel like a dream when you wake up.

They don’t. Instead you just feel gloom gnawing at everything inside you, and have to mechanically push yourself up and out to find everyone else, because your brain has decided that this is the next step and the death of your kismesis hasn’t stopped the planet’s orbit. Eridan was the one who started this, you remember, dully. At the time, you figured it was to buy his way back into Feferi’s good graces, but now you kind of think it was just that he was sick of killing lusii and sick of living up to Orphaner Dualscar.

_I don’t disagree_ , he says in your memory with crystal clarity, and you keep walking because you don’t know what else to do.

The brooding caverns are noisy. You run into six other trolls as you try to remember the path Aradia led you down, two of them setting off a subtle buzz in your horns and looking at you strangely as you do the same to them. You look into three blocks, each packed full of trolls, before you find one that has people you know in it.

Vriska is one of them.

She’s sitting with her back to the door, shoulder-to-shoulder with Kanaya and across from Terezi. Karkat sits next to Terezi, matching the blank look of disbelief that you imagine is on your face. It hasn’t really sunk in, for either of you.

“-first kismesis,” Vriska says, every appropriate note of shock and sadness in her voice. “I guess it was gonna happen, but-”

You freeze. Karkat’s glance snaps up to you, then back to Vriska. “It was ‘gonna happen’?”

“I-” Vriska manages to get out.

Karkat stands up, tries to make a fist reflexively, and winces when he jars his broken finger. “Fuck you, Serket. We were supposed to _stop_ people from dying. Even your _first kismesis_ managed to get it through his thick fucking panshield.” They’re the right words for Karkat, but too flat, and he leaves the room without looking at any of you. You step aside to let him pass, and wonder where he’s going, and if you can follow him there.

“I wish you hadn’t said that,” Kanaya sighs.

Vriska snorts, reclining so her arm lies behind Kanaya’s shoulders. “Why, you got some fresh insight on Vantas from avoiding locking ganderbulbs with him? I ain’t gonna deny he’s somehow managed to be good for the army, but he’s still an idealistic kid. I’m gonna miss Eridan too, you know? But thinking nobody was gonna die was _stupid_.”

“ _You’re_ going to miss ED,” you hiss out in a breath, and watch Vriska jump. “Fuck _you._ He’s been hunting lusii on his own since you fucked up your FLARP arrangement and I _know_ he fucking asked you for help. Don’t you fucking _dare_ use this to perform how _sad_ you are.”

Vriska throws up her hands. “Great! Fine! According to Sollux Captor, I don’t get to have feelings _at all_! What’s the matter, Sol, can’t take the reminder that someone hated Eridan and didn’t get him killed?”

You step forward, rage thrumming in your temples, power crackling in your hands. “Fucking _say that again_ -”

Before you know what’s happened, Terezi is in front of you. She slams a hand into your sternum and hooks a leg behind yours, and next thing you know you’ve bitten your tongue, you’re on the floor, and everything tastes of metal and salt. “Don’t,” Terezi says, when you start gathering your psi again. “Leave, Vriska.”

Vriska snarls. “ _He_ was-”

“ _He_ is mourning,” Terezi says, evenly. “ _You_ are in complete control of yourself, and goaded him. You also goaded Karkat, and now Kanaya and I are going to have to stop him from doing something truly idiotic.”

Vriska stands up. “Guess we all know what you care about,” she says, venom dripping from her voice. “Sorry I ever said I was sad!” Terezi holds you down as Vriska storms out of the room, then leans back in. “You still owe me a debt, Sol,” she says, sweetly. “But since you’re _mourning_ , it can wait a bit.”

Only Terezi’s nails digging into your shoulders save you from vaporising her then and there.

—

You don’t know what you do, in the couple nights that follow. Mostly you follow Terezi or Aradia, who have conspired between them to keep you from running into anyone, and let the trolls Karkat has collected stare at you. The story is starting to spread, and the idolisation in their eyes when they look at Karkat verges on sickening. _Look, he lost his matesprit for us, look at how much he cares, he hasn’t even stopped-_

They don’t know Karkat, and the way he gets wound up tighter and tighter when he’s upset. You’re just an object of pity adjacent to him, for them, and you’d scream at them if guilt didn’t flood your tongue every time you open your mouth.

Finally, Aradia kindly takes you by the scruff of the neck and dumps you at Equius’ doorstep. The hive is as familiar to you as your own, at this point, and you walk down to the basement without thinking, then stop and turn to look at her. “What are you doing?”

Aradia sighs and rakes a hand through her hair. “Feferi and I have to work out what to tell these kids about the rig and what’s happening, and I thought you’d rather not be around. And I’m going to have to figure out what to do about Vriska. She got her contribution notice, and it’s a bit late for me to back out now.” Quietly, she adds, “Afterwards, I want nothing to do with her.”

You surprise yourself by voluntarily hugging Aradia, your position lower down the stairs putting your head just under her chin. After a moment, she hugs you back, resting on you like you could possibly support anything right now. People have been cosseting you left, right and centre, but you haven’t responded, before this. The world feels too soft and sandpaper-harsh at the same time, and every gesture of kindness has only opened the wound back up.

It’s still bleeding. Maybe starting to slow down a bit.

“Stay with Equius,” she says into your hair. “We still don’t know…”

You nod into her collarbones, letting the words go unspoken. She pulls back after another long moment, and strokes your face before jogging back up the stairs.

Equius - moulted, built pretty much in the same terrifying configuration blown up to 200% - merely looks up from his work when your foot hits the basement floor, and says, “Captor. I heard.”

You give him a _mnh_ of acknowledgement that serves to be enough on the subject, wake up the monitors of the computer you left running so many nights ago, and settle back in front of it.

Maybe you can pretend you never left. Deaths are easier to deal with when they’re numbers on a screen.

—

Living in the caverns for a few nights has left you over-sensitive to every single noise a troll could possibly make. This does not make for a good combination with the freshly-moulted Equius, who fumbles and drops things and mutters STRONG imprecations like ‘fiddlesticks’ under his breath.

The asshole part of you - which, to be fair, is the largest part of you - stirs a little below the numbness, bringing you somewhat back to wakefulness. When he drops piece of whatever he’s building for the third time in as many minutes and lets out a wordless growl, you snap. “The fuck is the problem, EQ?”

“I-” he says, stuttering like he forgot you were in the room. “Captor-”

You unfold yourself from your chair and make your way over to his desk, grabbing the piece on your way. There’s no telling what it is, but it’s easy enough to see where the delicate shape slots in with the rest, so you hold it in place and raise an eyebrow expectantly until Equius fumbles for the connecting pin. “Seriously,” you say, not looking at him because you don’t want to watch him feel sorry for you when he realises how badly you need the distraction. He slides the pin through the pieces you’re holding together, and you wait until everything is secure before saying, “What’s the problem?”

His hand jerks, but thanks to your foresight, everything stays in place. He does wreck another piece, but sighs and picks it up, flexing it in his hands before you can say anything. “I apologise for disturbing you.”

“Not an answer,” you say, picking up another piece to turn over in your hands.

“Captor,” he says, a minute amount of pleading in his voice. You shrug without looking, and get a defeated sigh. “I was thinking about the helmsrig, and the Fleet reaction,” he says, finally. There’s a long pause, and when you don’t say anything, he continues, reluctance colouring every syllable. “It is- unfortunate, that I won’t observe the future results of the project, once this panic has died down.”

You frown at the smooth metal in your hands, then look up. “Why?”

He looks at you, the shadow of his eyes wide behind his glasses. They’re a new pair to fit his new face, but already have cracks in them. “I-” he says, blue plastered across his cheeks. “I have neither concupiscent quadrant.”

“What,” you say, flatly.

Equius shrugs, and this time he’s the one to break eye contact by looking at the reshaped piece of metal in his hands. “I never made it much of a priority,” he says, finally. “The work seemed more important.”

You stare at him, speechless. At least he’s not treating you like spun glass, like everyone else is, but: no. _No_. Bile rises in your throat as you trace the reasoning back, and you are _not_ having anyone else die because of this stupid _fucking_ rig you never wanted to build in the first place.

“No,” you say, and see his eyes dart towards you, shadows of movement behind his glasses. You grab his chin and drag him in - and he comes, unresisting, a step behind your reasoning - and kiss him. Hurt and numb and terrified, you kiss him, burying your hands in his hair as soon as you’re close enough, and try to drown out the wave of panic that hit you at his offhand mention of expecting to die.

Equius pushes at you, gently first and then more insistently when you don’t move. He’s only gotten stronger after moulting, and you get too surprised by his actions to push back with his psi. “Captor,” he says, confused and trying so hard to protect your fucking feelings, like everyone else.

“ _No,_ ” you snap, vehemence in your voice you don’t expect. “Don’t you fucking dare. Eridan-” speaking his name feels like a ball of spikes has lodged in your throat, but you continue anyway, “-Eridan died because of this fucking _thing_. It’s not happening again. Why the fuck would you think that I would let that happen?”

Equius swallows. “You don’t have feelings for me.”

You edge in close to his personal space, leaving the barest fingerwidth of air between you. “Don’t,” you say, and your voice breaks alarmingly, “tell me how I feel. I promise you, EQ, you don’t have the slightest fucking _clue_.”

Carefully, more carefully than you want him to, he cups your face in one hand, and exhales in disbelief when you let him. He leans in, just a fraction, and that’s all the invitation you need to close the gap and kiss him again, burying your hands in folds of his shirt to stop them from shaking. He kisses you back this time, a little salty and bruising and awkward, and you do your utmost to hide away in the actions and physical feelings, bringing your thoughts to bear on the moment and running away from your problems.

Equius, hands gentle and uncertain and sure, lets you.

—

He watches you like he’s afraid you’re going to take it back, after. You just shrug, settle back into the numbness of your shell, and let him watch. If he doesn’t get by now that you wouldn’t have pailed him had you not trusted him and pitied him, that even as you are you still make your own decisions , he’s not going to. Slowly, he thaws and relaxes, and for a while the two of you go back to what feels something like normalcy, each comfortably working on your own thing.

Feferi interrupts the peace by messaging you.

— cuttlefishCuller [CC] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —  
CC: Sollux, are you t)(ere?  
TA: yeah.  
CC: O)(! Good.  
CC: Araydia and I talked. And…  
CC: I can’t put off krilling Gl’bgolyb muc)( longer. Eit)(er we do it now or )(ave a guillotine )(anging over our )(eads.  
TA: ii can be ready whenever.  
CC: O)(. Um, okay.  
CC: Are you… eeling okay?  
TA: yeah. don’t worry about me, ff.  
TA: you have biigger thiing2 two worry about riight now.  
CC: Yea)(.  
CC: Will you meet me and Araydia in the cove? We s)(oald get t)(ere in aboat an )(our.  
TA: on iit.  
— twinArmageddons [TA] has ceased trolling cuttlefishCuller [CC] —

You stand up and stretch, feeling Equius look at you in alarm before settling back down. “I have to go help FF with a thing,” you tell him.

He glances at you again, before turning back to his work. “Be careful.”

“Don’t let anyone in,” you tell him, too aware of what happened the last time you left a quadrantmate alone. He nods, once, and you start planning the best course to Feferi’s cove. It happens to avoid Eridan’s hive, but that, of course, is a coincidence.

You are awful at lying to yourself.

—

Thankfully, Feferi seems over her bout of handling you tentatively by the time you get there. She hands you and Aradia breathers and says in anxious, distracted sentences. “I’m going to have to feed the two of you power when we get down far enough. Stay close to me, but don’t get near her beak. I have to talk to her.” She stops pacing, and faces the two of you, worry plain. “This might kill you. This might kill everyone.”

“It might not,” Aradia says, and you shrug in agreement since you took the liberty of strapping your breather on already.

“Okay,” Feferi says, and takes a short, deep breath. “Let’s go.”

It takes an hour to swim down, even with you and Aradia boosting the three of you along with your powers. Before long, it gets too dark to see beyond the wavering circle of light that your psionics projects, and you follow Feferi blindly down into the deeps. You start feeling _wrong_ about twenty minutes in, and when Feferi notices you rubbing at your face, trying to shake the weird feeling from your sinuses, she reaches out and grabs your hand, then takes Aradia’s as well. The feeling clears up immediately in a way you haven’t felt since the first time you dove down to Feferi’s hive and she healed you on the way.

You didn’t realise what the depth was doing to you, and she takes you down further still.

It scares you, the first tentacle that drifts past. You almost feel normal for a minute, heart pumping and blood rushing and alert like you haven’t been in nights. Then you get used to it, silent limbs as thick around as a drone floating through the water. Not much later, they become as thick as your hivestem, and Feferi leads you to the centre of them before letting go of both of you and kicking her way forward.

You knew seadweller speech existed, but you didn’t expect it to be song. Feferi sings to her lusus, the bare shadow of her visible in your light. She talks with her hands, gesturing even though it’s lost on Gl’bgolyb, and in every motion is despair.

Then, after Feferi’s song dies down, a whisper so immense your pan can’t handle it responds in mournful song. You reach up and wipe at your ear, your fingers coming away with yellow that the ocean quickly wisps away, and are unsurprised. Gl’bgolyb’s song rattles your teeth and makes your throat seize up, and Aradia has her hands clapped over her ears, eyes scrunched up in pain. Then Gl’bgolyb quiets, and Feferi swims back to you.

You wouldn’t mention the tears that the water turns to nothingness, even if your mouth weren’t covered. She gestures to you and Aradia with her hands, then shapes a dome.

You look uncertainly to Aradia. A psionic field around Gl’bgolyb is no small ask, and the two of you won’t be able to hold it for long if you manage to get it in place to start with. She matches your uncertain look, only to be interrupted by Feferi thumping her chest with a fist.

Trust her. Right.

You make a small ball of psi and hold it out to Aradia. With a frown of utter concentration, she carefully weaves her own psi into the mix, stabilising it against yours so the whole construction doesn’t collapse in on itself. Then, together, you start expanding the bubble. First it encompasses the two of you, then Feferi, and you grow it at a steady pace to the beat of power that thrums in your horns.

It starts hurting once you can no longer see the borders, but you grit your teeth and throw yourself into the feel of it. You know your power like breathing, and Aradia’s might as well be the same. The two of you have to fight for every inch, but just as you feel you’ve reached the breaking point, where the power is about to snap and lash back at you, burn you up from the inside out, Feferi flashes the two of you a double thumbs-up and rests her hands on your shoulders. Coolness floods through you, and the load somehow becomes bearable.

Then she starts singing, and purple fire races outwards. You feel it wrap around your barrier, far away, and push a little more; Aradia does the same.

Feferi sings, and keeps singing, and Gl’bgolyb ceremoniously offers her one of her finer tentacles, wrapping it around Feferi’s waist with all the care of a lusus. Her beak, invisible to you in the darkness of the ocean before, emerges; then you realise that no, Gl’bgolyb’s entire body is burning with the same purple fire, lighting the depths as if it were day. You have to squint and look away as the tentacle around Feferi’s waist bursts aglow - and then the fire starts seeping into Feferi’s skin.

Gl’bgolyb screams then, the entire ocean floor shaking with it. You scream too, the breather trapping the air you screech out, and you keep screaming nonetheless, doubling over with the unbearable pain of the Empress’ lusus dying. You should be dying, part of you knows, but the rest of you is reduced to nothing but the pain and the need to keep the shield burning, and whatever is keeping you alive through what feels like death is keeping Aradia with you, because her psi never falters. Through it all, Feferi’s song weaves, grieving echoing in your bones.

The purple light begins to die out at Gl’bgolyb’s furthest reaches, Feferi becoming incandescent with it. Then her light fades, too, and Gl’bgolyb’s scream washes away, and you’re left again in darkness and pain with only the feel of Feferi under your hand and Aradia’s psi in your horns reassuring you that you’re not alone.

She taps you on the shoulder, twice, and you hope that means you’re done. Were you walking, you’d be about to fall over; as it is, you think it might be nice to pass out. Your psi barrier breaks with barely a thought, and you feel Aradia doing the same, and dare to expend a little energy on lighting up around you again.

Feferi swims you up, towing the both of you like limp rags and resting every so often. Drained beyond compare, you let her, only expending energy when you break surface and crawl up the shore until you’re out of the water. With the very last of your reserves, you roll over onto your back and stare up at the sky.

“What was that?” Aradia asks, the exhaustion in her voice rivalling the exhaustion in every cell of your body.

“Mom agreed,” Feferi says, her voice hollow and blank. “I took her life. It still hurt her.”

The three of you lie there for a long time, watching the stars pass. Somewhere up there is the Battleship Condescension, and you can barely bring yourself to care. This ordeal was enough.

After an hour, Feferi hauls herself up, then tosses her palmtop onto your chest. “Film me,” she says, quietly. You would have refused any request on sheer principle, but you can’t argue with the bleakness in her voice. It’s a close companion to your own.

When you give her the nod, holding her palmtop as level as you can, she looks straight into the camera without bothering to hide her weariness. “You know what just happened,” she says. “You killed my friend and supporter in an effort to scare me off this path. I’m not some terrified shrimp of a thing, and you made a mistake.” Absently, she rakes her wet hair away from her face. “I don’t care about becoming Empress. I care about the Empire. And I won’t let you drive what I love into the ground anymore.” After a moment, to make sure she’s done, you cut the recording.

She collapses back into the sand between you and Aradia. “Upload it wherever you need to,” she tells you.

You let the palmtop fall back against your chest and close your eyes. After a moment, Feferi sneaks her hand into yours, and all you can do is squeeze back; Aradia doing the same as Feferi chokes back sobs.

It’s been a bad week for losing. Now you need to win, or all of this fuckery will have been for nothing.


	25. Chapter 25

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for the delay! Have a chapter.

Everyone loses steam after Gl’bgolyb’s death. You tell this by the frequency of messages that come your way, since you’re entirely done with being in the heart of the revolution for a while. Instead of getting into the thick of things, you crawl into your cupe and share it with your self-loathing.

You’re unneeded now. Created the Helmsrig, set up a system that should - _ha_ \- keep the rest of your revolutionaries uncompromised until Ascension, killed Gl’bgolyb.

Got your kismesis murdered through your sheer arrogance.

Yeah, you’re pretty fucking done. Aradia checks up on you, but it’s easy enough to deflect her; she’s busy, anyway, has a thousand other responsibilities to worry about. Karkat - well, for all that you have any right to understand Karkat, the image Aradia builds of him over Trollian is of a Karkat that is about to explode. You almost hope he’ll explode at you. It might shock you back into - into being _you_ , instead of this hollowed-out shell that does nothing but eat and sleep and stare blankly at walls.

Aradia asks what you’re doing, when she speaks to you. Try as you might, you can’t remember doing a single thing. Equius is more circumspect, and you appreciate his stiff distance, for once. He messages you once, saying that his hive is open to you, and you imagine he sweated over the message for a good four hours before sending it.

Terezi is the one who saunters into your block like she owns it, three nights after you start your bleak experiments on how long a troll can remain immersed in slime before their skin starts sloughing off.

Her nose wrinkles as you’re still processing her presence. “Ugh, Appleberry.”

You consider her over the rim of your cupe for a moment, then say, “Fuck off, TZ,” in the most weary tones you can dredge up before sinking back into your sopor. Two seconds later, right on schedule, there’s a thin, bony hand yanking you out of the cupe by your horn. You put up a token resistance of moderate flailing, and one of your claws catches her in the arm.

“ _Ow_ , you-” She growls over the last word and hauls you fully out of the recuperacoon before licking teal beads of blood from the scratch. “Don’t you think you’ve caused enough harm for the time being?”

“Wow,” you say, after a moment, and lean back against the warmth of the cupe as you look up at her. It should hurt, but it doesn’t; you’ve buried yourself too deep, and all that’s talking with Terezi now is a projection of your usual personality. You try adding a sneer and repeat, “ _Wow_. Low blow.”

She folds her arms. It’s dark, in your block, because you’d have had to crawl out of the cupe on your own volition to have turned on the lights at any point, and of course she doesn’t care. It turns her glasses into an ambiguous black, makes her shapeless against the shadows. She’s as unrecognisable as you are. “It would be,” she says, unforgiving, “if you were here to hear it. Are you getting in the ablutions stall or am I making you?”

At this point, it’s probably easier to go along with her than to dig in your heels. You shrug and lope off to the ablutions stall, and feel a malicious satisfaction when she steps in the trail of sopor you’re leaving.

—

You have to admit, you thought about just standing in your ablutionsblock until Terezi went away. It’s like you’re some kind of clockwork toy, these nights, and without someone around to wind you up you just run down until you fall over. The part of you that was awake once knows that Terezi won’t leave until she’s finished with you, though, and it manages to pilot you through the motions of making yourself presentable for society.

Terezi closes her eyes and inhales when you step out, then nods. “Better. _Clean_ clothes, Appleberry, we’re going out and I don’t want to be flying with the bacteria your laundry must be cultivating by now.”

You flip her off on your way to getting dressed, and call out to her, “What makes you think I want to fly you anywhere?”

Terezi laughs. Nobody has been laughing happily for a while now, with all the stress you’ve all been under, but it’s all been sounding hollow and forced ever since you all learned you weren’t invincible, and hers is no exception. Her usual cackle is just a whip-crack, and it’s significantly more self-deprecating than it used to be. “We’re going to Eridan’s hive. I rather figured you wouldn’t want me pawing through his things unsupervised.”

Part of your shell cracks, your hands fisting in your shirt before you can stop them. After a long moment, you relax them and shrug into the shirt. “Does KK know?”

“Mmm,” Terezi replies, which isn’t an answer. She walks, soundless, into your block, wraps her arms around you from behind and doesn’t pay attention to the way you startle. Her touch is awkward and claustrophobic, which it never has been before. This is probably how she feels when you lay an arm over her shoulders and pull her against your side when you talk about Gamzee or Vriska, and you’d be sorry about subjecting her to it if you could. “Sollux,” she says, as quiet as her walk, making your name forlorn and plaintive. “Did you think I didn’t care about you and Eridan?”

Your hands tense into fists again at the sound of his name. You haven’t been thinking it, you’ve been _avoiding_ it, you’re so _sick_ of the way everyone has been shaping his name into something hushed and precious around you - but Terezi says his name without an ounce of shame, exactly the same intonation she used on yours and you can’t, you _can’t_ -

“I’ve always been the more troublesome of us, when it comes to kismeses,” she says, into your shoulderblades. Your breath hitches in your throat, and she doesn’t flinch. “That doesn’t mean I wasn’t watching. I was glad that you somehow fell backwards into the most aggravating black relationship that you could have possibly found. I was _glad_ that I didn’t have to intervene. Eridan pulled himself together and managed to provide a black partnership that didn’t drag you down, which is a feat not to be understated.” She laughs a sad laugh again, a wet hiccough more than anything else. “You have always been very intent on dragging yourself down. Eridan kept you afloat, and in his absence, I am not letting work go to waste. Do you understand?”

“I-” you say, except your voicebox collapses halfway through, and then you choke. You can’t breathe, after that, trying to swallow down the embarrassing noises you make and choking on the air you do draw in and trying to gulp more, and it’s only when Terezi resettles her arms and rests her forehead on your back more comfortably that you realise you’re crying, and have been since she started. “It’s my fault,” you tell her, helpless in the certainty that she doesn’t pity you, _she_ won’t tell you soothing lies.

She sighs. “Perhaps. More likely Eridan died for a number of reasons, and you’re flattering yourself. _We_ are going to go find out, if you can pull yourself together.” When you wipe your face with a hand, clenching your teeth together and not saying anything in an effort to get yourself under control, she lets you go and takes a step back. “It wouldn’t be something that would help Karkat,” she says, and shrugs a shoulder. “You have always been an obsessive, fatalistic idiot, though.”

You take a deep breath, gratified when it only rattles you a little. “What are we looking for?”

Terezi holds out a hand. After a moment, you take it, linking your fingers with hers. “I’ll know it when I see it,” she says, and it’s so - so _Terezi_ that even as you are now, you can’t help but roll your eyes.

—

The good thing about this, the one good thing, is that Eridan’s hive doesn’t hold any particularly powerful memories for you. It still feels wrong to be there, with its emptiness and echo. Nobody’s tried to raid the place, which makes it exactly as eerily pristine as it was the last time you were here. Terezi wanders in while you’re still trying to find a light switch, and she makes an annoyed noise when you flick them on.

“Everything’s old,” she says, wrinkling her nose. “Where was his body?”

You shove your initial, flinching reaction down and lead her over to where you found Eridan. “Tell me you’re not going-”

She licks the floor. Of course she does.

“Isn’t that contaminating the scene?” you mutter, shoving your hands into your pockets so you don’t start doing something stupid like hugging yourself. You’ve spent the past few days numbing yourself, and the tendrils of feeling eating away at your composure are something you don’t want to deal with. The sooner you get out of here, the quicker you can build those walls back up.

Terezi pushes herself back up in one smooth movement. “They cleaned up,” she tells you, and then grins. Nothing about it is friendly. “I do enjoy a challenge! Step outside, Appleberry.”

You retreat to the hall that leads to the rest of Eridan’s hive, and watch as Terezi methodically dismantles the room. In the unfamiliar confines of the room, she goes slowly, breathing deep through her nose as she paces around the boundary of her room and works her way in. Finally, she stops at a small table and high-backed, heavy chairs arranged around a porthole that has a good view of moonset over the ocean. “Something’s wrong here.” When you don’t move, she sighs. “I didn’t bring you along for your devastating good looks.”

There is suddenly nothing you want more in this world than to not be here. Instead, because you stopped pretending the world wasn’t out to fuck you over sweeps ago, you float your way over to Terezi and stare at the table. It’s solid, dark wood - of course it is, with Eridan’s compulsive seadweller need to impress - and at first you don’t see whatever Terezi’s picked up on, but then you tilt your head and the light refracts off a spot wrong.

Leaning closer, then shifting to get out of the light, you see a darker stain on the wood. “Blood, maybe,” you say. When you wipe at it, it doesn’t budge. “A stain, anyway.”

Terezi frowns. “There was no blood where Eridan was found.” It’s not a question, but you nod anyway, and she leans down to the stain framed by your fingers to lick it carefully. “It’s his blood,” she announces, her frown getting deeper.

The two of you make a good duo, usually. Normally, you’d be arguing points with her - how old is it, are you sure it’s his and not some other seadweller, and it would help her brain tick through the possibilities and discard the improbable ones until she somehow knows exactly what happens. Right now, you just want to go back to your cupe. Part of you, the part that’s still thinking of these objections, is hammering against the walls of your numbness, and letting them crack once was enough for one night. You can’t handle it happening twice.

She rests a hand on your shoulder for a brief moment before turning slowly around the room. “Did his body show any signs of a fight?”

“He was fucking pristine,” you say, and then try out a bitter laugh. “No cuts, no bruises, nothing in his claws. Like he decided to just lie down and die.”

Terezi makes a thoughtful noise, thankfully ignoring your sad attempt at faking emotions. “Poison,” she says, finally. “Someone poisoned him at the table with something nasty. He coughed up blood. There’s nothing obviously missing or broken, here, so it must have incapacitated him fairly quickly. The poisoner watched him die, cleaned up, and left.”

You fold your arms and watch as Terezi sits down in the seat closer to the bloodstain. “KK thinks they took his scarf,” you tell her, as she mimes coughing.

She flaps a hand at you until you move away, then stumbles out of the chair, falls and crawls backwards to where you found Eridan’s body. “What poison works this quickly?” she asks, although this time it’s to herself. “Did he manage to get his rifle out?”

You shrug.

“Some help you are.” She scoots back until she’s leaning against the wall. “No scarf, no rifle, no lusus.”

That draws you up short. Where the fuck _is_ his lusus? Seadweller lusii are every bit as territorial as their wards; he should be trying to chase you out of the hive. He should have been trying to chase you out of the hive when you _found_ Eridan. But like Terezi’s spent this time establishing, the hive is as perfect as a museum display. There’s no sign of struggle, and regardless of what Eridan did, his lusus would have started breaking things as soon as Eridan started coughing up blood. “Trophies?” you say, finally, losing yet another fragment of your composure. Your power slips and crackles in the air around you, and a piece of your self slips out from under the numbness you’ve built. You did the weeping thing with Aradia, and you don’t think you have it in you to do it again, but anger?

Anger, you can use.

Terezi breathes in again, then stretches to pick up the same cup that Karkat was looking at, the last time you were here. She frowns at it, then licks the inside before you can stop her.

“Fucking _poison_ , TZ!” You slap the cup away from her with psi, feeling the first wave of panic bubbling up inside you.

“It’s been cleaned, you disaster,” she says, shaking her hand out. You weren’t exactly gentle about knocking the cup out of her fingers. “Recently. As overblown as Eridan was, I doubt he had much call for using the impressive dinner set on a regular basis. You may wish to sweet-talk your sweaty mountain into running some tests on it.”

Your heart still thumping, high on adrenaline after watching Terezi nearly kill herself in front of you and too panicked to get your aloof mask back on, you feel yourself blush right out to your ears. Instead of doing what you really want to, which is screech at her in frustration about everyone you love apparently being intent on having this coup kill them one way or another, you yank the cup back to you and bury it in your sylladex. “What are you going to do?”

“I’ll stay here a while.” The corner of her mouth turns down. “This was entirely too perfect a strike at us, Appleberry. Too targeted, too choreographed, too _clean_. The timeline is too tight. I guarantee you that there is evidence of a murderer’s mistake here somewhere, and I am going to find it.”

“And then?” you ask, even though you think you know the answer. Terezi is a Scourge Sister, after all, and she earned her half of that reputation fairly. At its heart, this revolution is just another lethal match, and the blood on her hands equals the blood on Eridan’s and Vriska’s.

She smiles, a slow, sharp grin. “Justice,” she says, and you’re glad she’s on your side.

—

You drop Terezi at the brooding caverns before heading to Equius’ hive. Part of you is mentally running around in panicked circles, given that you think the two of you are probably matesprits now and you’re not entirely sure how to deal with that. The rest of you shoves it down with all the rest of everything you’re ignoring and locks it behind the promise of _later_. Later, when this is over and you can stop worrying that each of your friends is next to die. Later, when all of you can stop trying to topple the Empire and turn to the task of rebuilding it.

Equius is in the lab, elbow-deep in biowire and so focussed on his work that he barely notices your entrance. At least this is something familiar, a dynamic you can deal with. He mutters an inarticulate thanks to you when you hold a clump of wires out of his way as he tries to join two impossibly-fine filaments. After a moment, you nudge his hands out of the way and do it with psionics instead.

The biowire tugs on your power and suddenly you feel it coursing through - through _everything_ , getting drunk down by the circuit and taking more. You can’t see whatever Equius has wired it to - knowing your luck, you’re probably powering some kind of deathbot, and you can’t make your fingers open to cut the circuit. “EQ,” you say, voice thin, and after a moment the wire is snatched out of your hands, breaking again in the process.

“Captor,” he says, horror dawning in his voice as if he’s just realised you’re there. He looks like - like you must have, when you realised how you’d fucked up and gotten other people hurt. “I-”

“I’m fine.” You wave a hand dismissively, although the fact that you’re still trembling at the feel of your psionics being dragged out of you - the loss of control, fuck, it felt like _Vriska_ \- takes away from the effect. It was stupid of you to get involved without knowing what he was doing, anyway. In an effort to distract him from the utter failure that was your attempt at helping, you paste a hooked grin on your face and say, “Are you seriously still calling me Captor?”

There’s a moment where he just looks at you, and you see the shadow of his blink behind his glasses. Then, “Sollux,” he says, slow and testing. Before you can muster up an appropriate reaction, he turns back to the biowire tangle, picking through the wires. “I was uncertain you would…” When he can’t find the words he was looking for, he tries again. “I didn’t wish to assume.”

You’re detached from romance at the best of times. You’ve never been good at seeing advances for what they are, and the fact that you’ve had any quadrantmates willing to put up with you - blunt, selfish, defensive you - is incredible in and of itself. Aradia put it best when she said you suck at people, and that’s when you’re not ruthlessly excising the parts of you that can’t cope.

Even with that, even with your general stupidity and how unlikeable you are, it is blindingly obvious that Equius Zahhak has - for some forsaken reason - fallen hard for you, over the course of your acquaintance.

You wish he hadn’t. Because Eridan died for your mistakes, and every time you think that it’s like holding your hand to a hotplate and relishing in the burn - he’s _gone_ , and you still get that jolt of unpleasant realisation every time you think his name. It’s stopped hurting, or it hurts all the time, and you can’t tell which. If you had the time and privacy to drop your numbness, you could figure it out, but the universe doesn’t wait on one emotionally-stunted fuckup’s grief.

It would be unfair to Equius, to promise him things you don’t have in you. Every reserve you have is going towards piloting yourself through one more item on your to-do list, and even if you were living in a perfect world and the only people you had gotten killed didn’t have your heart in their hands, you’re an idiot when it comes to feelings. At the same time, it would be equally unfair to play it off as an emotionally-confused mistake.

“At some point between having my tongue halfway down your throat and getting my shirt off, I think you earned being on a first-name basis,” you say before the silence can get too awkward, aiming for dry and flippant. It’s good, you think, promising nothing and stepping on nothing, and just saying it makes you feel tired. Too much of you is going into this facade. You reach for the biowire again, because if you’re trying to figure out what Equius is making of it, you can lose yourself in that deduction for a while.

Equius intercepts your hand, closing his fingers around your wrist with gentle pressure. He doesn’t like to touch people, you’ve noticed. He maintains a stiff, respectful distance from Aurthour, locks in place when Nepeta climbs over him. When drawing on your arm, he didn’t lean his other hand on you to stabilise himself, didn’t rest his wrist against your skin. Even working on Aradia, his every movement is precise and careful.

“I would-” he says, then stops. Fuck, you don’t want to deal with this. “It was a choice you made under extreme circumstances,” he pieces together, striving for the perfect words. “I would not presume to hold you to it.”

You look at your wrist engulfed in his hand, and the tangled mess of biowire underneath, and nothing. It’s interesting, comparing the Equius who started down this road with you to the Equius across from you now. “I’m tired,” you say, when it becomes obvious that he’s waiting for acknowledgement. “I’ve spent the past three nights drowning myself in sopor and I’m still so fucking tired.” He’s gotten used to your casual profanity at some point, doesn’t flinch or grimace anymore. “Couldn’t sleep, even with the sopor. You know what it all comes back to?”

He makes an articulate noise, more to tell you he’s listening than to answer your question.

“She wouldn’t have killed Eridan if I’d kept my mouth shut about Helmsmen.” You close your eyes, shove a hand under your glasses to press against them. You’re not crying so much as leaking, too tired - too _worn-out_ to face the words you’re saying. “You built the rig. It’s a good project for a blueblood, would’ve gotten you anywhere in the Empire you wanted after a conversation about how important it is that the Empire keeps going, and then it would have been buried again.” Your mouth twitches into a bitter smile, the first honest expression you’ve worn in what feels like a lifetime. “I’m the only person on this fucking planet who could have spread it through the Empire.”

“Blaming yourself-” Equius begins.

“Blame?” You laugh. “Fuck _blame_. I hate Vriska, because she doesn’t think her actions have consequences and makes excuses, she- how many trolls do you think she killed, to feed her lusus? Hundreds? Thousands? How many people has she fucked over like AA and TZ?” You look away. “I ripped out one of the foundations of the Empire and convinced every single one of you that it was for the greater good. Fucking _millions_ are dead because of me, and I did it so well that the retribution didn’t even hit me.” Equius’ hand has slackened around your wrist, so you pull it away. “I knew what I was doing. I went past blame three fucking nights ago. I want to _rip myself to shreds_ , EQ.” You take a moment to let that sink in, then say, reflective, “I should’ve just gotten in the fucking Helmsblock.”

There’s a long, long moment of silence. Just as you’re about to start locking all of it away again - you need to _fix_ this, or at the very least see it through, and you can’t while you’re hyperventilating about all the damage you’ve caused - Equius says, “Would it have changed anything?” Before you can point out the obvious, he says, “The Heiress would have fought, and Ampora would have fought beside her. Vantas would have joined them. Their lives would have been spent with no effect; in five sweeps nobody would remember their names.” His mouth goes thin, pressed closed in disapproval. “Regardless of the outcome of the Heiress’ succession fight, a needless and wasteful act by the Empire has been eradicated by your action. You would have been wasted as a Helmsman.”

You swallow harshly. “Fuck it. I might as well be a Helmsman. I can’t start thinking or- this starts happening.” Viciously, you shove your glasses back in place, swallow the screaming down. You’re broken - you broke yourself - but fuck if you’re going to fall to pieces yet. There’s plenty of time for that after Feferi puts a culling fork through Condesce. “Can’t talk about quadrants. Sorry.” You never thought you’d be disappointed in yourself for running away from a conversation with Equius, but here you are. You bury your hands in the biowire. “So, what-”

Carefully, Equius reaches over the table. When he sees you startle, he stops, but takes your chin in his hand anyway after a pause. You let him, and feel sick, because he’s going to pretend you have something to offer him that isn’t a carefully-arranged block tower of barely-working coping methods. “I will not,” he says, “allow you to destroy yourself with this.” His words hold a promise you don’t understand, so you just shrug. It’s a good all-purpose response. “You came for a reason, I assume,” he says, after a moment.

You exhale. You were expecting him to kiss you, after a lifetime of being subjected to KK’s shitty movies. “Yeah.” You pull the cup out of your sylladex. “The poison was in this, TZ thinks. I was hoping to run some tests.”

Equius takes the cup and turns it in his hands, his expression going tight for a moment. “I will.”

“I got it,” you protest and reach to take it back.

He moves the cup away. “You have not slept in three days,” he informs you. “Or eaten, I imagine. I would hardly trust you with a chair at the moment, let alone the rest of the lab.”

You could weep, if you hadn’t spent the entire previous conversation embarrassingly losing your shit. He’s taking a cue from you, acting normal, and that makes it that much easier to fall into the routine and stop thinking. “You say that like I couldn’t use the lab in my sleep anyway.”

Equius sighs. “Sollux.” Your name still sounds odd from him. “Kindly go upstairs and eat before you collapse. I have no desire to reconstruct my work.”

That seems like enough back-and-forth to be a conversation. You don’t, in all honesty, have that much of an urge to do the analysis yourself, and the time it takes to eat something will let the both of you get over your breakdown. So you nod, and float back up the stairs, and hope this means that you haven’t broken him, as well.

—

— arachnidsGrip [AG] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —  
AG: Heeeeeeeey, Sol!  
TA: what  
AG: Look, no hard feelings, right? We were all feeling kind of emotional!  
AG: It’s 8een a rough week. Things were said that shouldn’t have 8een said.  
AG: I’m willing to let it 8e water under the 8ridge if you are!  
TA: vk  
TA: ii have never been le22 iintere2ted iin your bull2hiit  
TA: 2hove your wrecked 2hiip up your a22 and go fuck your2elf  
AG: Huh. Fine, you wanna play rough, I’ll play rough.  
AG: You’ve always 8een so scared of me coming after you or Megido.   
TA: go near her and ii wiill riip out your horn2 and beat you two death wiith them.  
AG: Yeah, yeah, I’ve heard it all 8efore. Don’t worry, she’s not even here!  
AG: I’m just saying. You’ve always 8een soooooooo worried I’m going to throw away everything I’ve 8uilt for myself and get 8ack in the revenge cycle game. And you keep pissing me off anyway! It’s almost like you w8nt to tempt me into it.  
AG: I just want to live my life, Sol. You’re the one getting in my way.  
AG: And I 8et it stings, right? Megido was nearly killed 8y your hands, and now you’ve fucked up 8ig time and got Eridan killed 8ecause you couldn’t cover your tracks properly. That’s gotta 8urn!  
TA: do you have a poiint  
AG: Yeah. Thing is, we all know how you tick. How 8roken are you feeling, Sol?  
AG: I just wanted to finish up our 8usiness arrangement! It’s mutually 8eneficial: You want me to fuck off, and I want to fuck off. Eridan’s pro8a8ly just the start, and I don’t particularly want to 8e caught up in this disaster when it comes crashing down.  
TA: there2 nothiing 2toppiing you  
TA: dont let the door hiit you on the way out  
AG: Turns out I need that last ship! It takes some assets to disappear, and it takes some time to liquefy an asset like a ship. I’m cutting it fine as it is, 8ecause Empress for8id I interrupt your mourning.  
TA: 2tiill cant be fucked 2ortiing out your problem2 for you  
TA: after due con2iideratiion iim goiing to have two 2tiick wiith my iiniitiial re2pon2e of go fuck your2elf  
AG: Fine, you want incentive?  
AG: I’m sick of the revenge cycle. I really am! You’re not the only one w8ing for the other shoe to drop all the time.  
AG: 8ut hey. It’s 8een nice l8ly. I had reason to keep the peace.  
AG: You wipe that reason out? I’m not going to take over you and kill Megido, or take over Megido and kill you.   
AG: We 8oth know that they’ll 8ackfire somehow, and I’m already down an arm and an eye, right?  
AG: I won’t take chances.  
AG: I will take control of this entire army, wipe out Megido, Vantas, Kanaya, and Terezi, and then come for you. May8e you can slaughter the entire army! You’re pretty powerful.  
AG: 8ut you can’t do it and still win the war. And in the meantime, everyone’s dead, 8ecause you 8acked me into a corner instead of paying your de8ts.  
TA: let me gue22  
TA: ii cant warn anyone becau2e you pull the triigger a2 2oon a2 you feel threatened  
AG: That’s a8out the shape of it!  
TA: have you ever cared about anyone other than your2elf  
AG: Why? It’s 8een made a8undantly clear to me that no8ody else is going to.  
AG: 8luh 8luh huge 8itch, I know. 8ut I’m a huge 8itch with irons in the fire, and I’m not dum8 enough to think the irons are going to like 8eing shaped.  
AG: So.  
AG: Are you going to co-operate?  
TA: iill leave in the eveniing, iit2 two late riight now  
AG: Good. I’ll 8e w8ing.  
— arachnidsGrip [AG] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —

You sigh and drop your palmtop onto the table with a clatter before resting your head in your hands. You’re not even angry, with this to top off everything that’s happened. Of _course_ Vriska decided that now is the time to kick your feet out from under you before stabbing you in the back. The fucking _army,_ how did you not _think_ of that-

Aurthour makes a concerned noise from across the room. You push your panic down, drop your hands, and start eating again. You’re going to need the calories.

—

Aradia finds you at Equius’ hive. You think you might have worried him with your tirade, and you can’t exactly fault him for calling in your moirail. He’s about as well-equipped to deal with complete emotional breakdowns as you are.

You decide to get the worst of things out of the way, so you stretch as you stand up and tell her, “I’m doing Vriska’s last thing tomorrow.”

“Of course you are,” Aradia sighs, and smooths a hand over your cheek. “If we’re getting bad news over with, I just got collections notice.”

The drones are getting closer, then. They must have started out by Eridan’s shore, and now they’re working their way in to more populated areas. They’ll probably be here in a few days, and then your hiveblock in a couple more. “Who are you getting flushed from?”

Aradia chews her lip before answering. Shit, she actually-? You’ve missed a lot, drowning yourself so you don’t have to listen to yourself speak. “Terezi,” she says, finally, and you let go of the breath you weren’t aware you were holding. Terezi is dangerous, yes, but the same things that make her dangerous mean that she’s incredibly unlikely to be a danger to Aradia.

You can’t deny the two of them have history, too.

“Cool,” you say, then jog down the stairs and stick your head into the lab; it’s probably impolite to leave without informing the host, especially after making him deal with you with your brakes off. “I’m leaving. Let me know if you turn up anything?”

Equius’ head jerks up when you start speaking, going from a grim look at whatever’s on his screen to panic to neutral in the space of a second. “Of course,” he says, after a moment.

Aradia takes you back to your hive. You’d expected her to leave you there, but instead she dumps you into your chair, looks around, and makes an annoyed noise. The place is kind of a bomb, you guess; you haven’t bothered to clean anything up, but it’s not like you’ve been doing anything that really generates mess. Still, Aradia picks all your laundry off the floor and turns on the filter cycle of your cupe, then rolls up her sleeves as she approaches your apiculture hives.

“Hey-” you protest.

Aradia rolls her eyes. “Like I don’t know how to do this by now.” You subside, and she carefully pulls out two heavy, full frames and places them carefully down. She puts two clean frames in their place, then slices the wax on the full frames away with her psionics and slots them into the extractor you built when it became apparent that you couldn’t keep up with the honey production on your own. “They’re not wrong-way-up,” she says, before you can say anything, shaking her sleeves back down. “So. You’re about to fall apart.”

You love Aradia. You have loved Aradia ever since forming a vague concept of what love is, and right now you wish you loved her a little less, because nobody should have to deal with you like this. “I-”

“Karkat too,” she says, and hops up to sit on your desk. “He’s decided it’s all his fault. So he’s going to be running around and baiting the Empire until Ascension, to try to keep Her Condescension’s attention away from the army.” She folds her arms and tilts her head, watching you for a reaction. When you have none to offer, she sighs. “Feferi thinks it’s all her fault, too. The three of you might have to fight over it.” You still don’t respond, so she sighs again, more heartfelt this time, and slides a hand into your hair. “Just don’t do anything stupid,” she says. “Finish up Vriska’s thing and come back. Win this thing with me. Deal with the rest when you can.”

You nod under her hand, your eyes half-closing. You have never deserved Aradia Megido. “That’s the plan,” you tell her, and your voice doesn’t break at all.

—

The weather takes a cold turn, most of the day’s heat gone by the time you wake up. Aradia stayed, and made sure you slept for real, her warmth behind you in the sopor and her hands on your horns whenever you woke up from your half-doze, soothing you insistently back into it. You needed those scraps of sleep more than you realised. It’s going to be a long, miserable flight to the last set of co-ordinates and back.

It’s early enough that nobody is online when you leave - fortified by some sleep, you kind of wish you could explain things better to Equius, or at least talk to Karkat and convince him to put his own stupid guilt on hold. Instead, you get to say goodbye to Aradia while squinting against the last of the day’s sun and rocket off to the far reaches of the Empire.

The first day, you nearly get caught out by the sun. You have to break into an empty hive with the last of your reserves, the skin on your exposed arms and the back of your neck starting to burn enough that you know you’ll get blisters popping up in a few hours. Whoever owned the hive has some dried sopor in a cupboard, though, so you mix it with some water, smear it on your skin, and hope for the best as you check Trollian to make sure nothing’s exploded.

— gallowsCalibrator [GC] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —  
GC: 1 SURM1S3 TH4T 4R4D14 TOLD YOU 4BOUT K4RK4TS L4T3ST PL4N TO JUMP OFF 4 CL1FF  
GC: PYR4LSP1T3 4ND 1 H4V3 B33N ROP3D 1NTO TH3 PROC33D1NGS S1NC3 H3 R34L1S3D TH4T H3 1S NOT 4CTU4LLY GO1NG TO G3T V3RY F4R BY W4LK1NG  
GC: 4G41NST MY B3TT3R JUDG3M3NT 1 4M TRUST1NG YOU TO NOT DO SOM3TH1NG DR4ST1C ON YOUR OWN 4DV3NTUR3  
GC: M4K3 SUR3 YOU COM3 B4CK SOLLUX  
GC: 1 TH1NK 3V3RYON3 1S GO1NG TO F4LL 4P4RT W1THOUT TH3 OTH3RS  
GC is an idle troll!  
GC has returned!  
GC: TH4NK YOU FOR TH3 TIM3LY W4RN1NG TH4T 4R4D14 H4S 4PP4R3NTLY D3C1D3D SH3 1S FLUSH3D FOR M3  
GC: TH4T W4SNT 4WKW4RD TO R34CT TO 1N TH3 MOM3NT 4T 4LL  
GC: 1 HOP3 YOU G3T 34T3N BY D4YW4LK3RS  
— gallowsCalibrator [GC] has ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —

You almost smile. Then you send a message to Aradia that you’re fine and find a good wall to huddle against for the day. Everyone is still offline, but it’s unsurprising. Communication has been patchy of late, since you’ve all been in roughly the same place and everyone else’s responsibilities have increased exponentially. Keeping the army running is a thankless task, from what you’ve gathered.

The next night goes much the same. The scenery has run out of hives, so all you get as you fly is miles of boring grass and dirt and worry at where you’re going to end up sheltering. Sopor helped, but your arms still itch, and you had enough of your skin peeling when you went through your moult. You end up hiding in a copse of trees, digging a hole into dry dirt and covering yourself with leaf litter, which is incredibly gross and only barely on the right side of being effective. Even with the cold snap, the day’s heat is still stifling, and you spend the entire time from sunrise to sunset sweating with leaves stuck to your skin. The last time you had to do something like this was when Aradia could still coax you out on digs.

At least it gives you something to think about.

The ship, this time around, is decrepit. It’s been scavenged before, since a lot of the plating near the ground is gone, and you can see the girders inside are red with rust. It might just be something about the weather here, but more likely this thing outdates most of the Empire. The people who raided it for scrap are probably dead of old age.

The interior structure of the ship is solid, if bare. You take photos as you walk through, the flash in your palmtop casting eerie shadows over thick layers of dust. The wiring is all gone, either because it was taken or because it’s rotted away, and when you rip off a panel to check you end up disturbing a nest of rats and have to stage a tactical retreat. One of the stairs gives out from under you on your way down to where you imagine the Helmsblock to be, ripping your jeans halfway to the knee, and by the time you get there you want to clear out and go home.

The Helmsblock stops you in your tracks. For all that you’ve spent most of your time since schoolfeeding collecting what knowledge you could about Helming, there have always been gaps in your knowledge. The oldest records you could find were still new enough that Helming was an established technique, standards had been established, and there was very little variation in technique.

This is different.

There’s no column in the centre. There are no channels in the walls for wires to travel through. There’s just a pit, a hole in the floor that you bet goes all the way to the hull, and a similar hole in the ceiling. You float between them and crane your neck back to look up.

No wonder there’s no wiring left. Biowire rots. It takes a long time, but it rots like dead meat, and this ship isn’t preserved by the dryness of a desert. This ship - this ship is so old that it must have been _all_ biowire, and you haven’t seen a whisper of a schematic that hasn’t included metal wiring. Whoever the Helmsman for this ship was, they grew into every inch of the ship - or maybe the ship grew into them.

You swallow. It sounds too loud, caught in the walls of the column. For a moment, you entertain a brief, dizzying fantasy of what it would have been like to be in here. The certainty of it worms straight into your heart and settles itself there; everyone could have taken their own chances, and the Empire would not be collapsing under its own weight. Going through the retrofittings? Oh, it would have been painful, but you have a better understanding of pain now. The operations would have hurt, and the biowire growing into you would have hurt, but soon enough you would have been beyond the pain.

You would have become something you hate, just another tool of the Empire, and you made the choices you made because you thought nothing could be worse.

You’ve learned. There are worse things to be than a battery.

After another moment floating in the pit, you set yourself down to the side, scuff away some dust against the wall and sit. It’s a nice fantasy, but reality needs you to keep your shit together long enough to keep the rest of you alive. The only way out is through, and after that you can decide if it was worth it.

Vriska’s not online, but it’s late again. You send the photos through, not particularly wanting to have to sit through a conversation with her anyway, and close your eyes. Some time later - hours? You’re so tired you’ve transcended exhaustion and no longer know whether or not you’re actually sleeping - your palmtop vibrates. You pick it up, expecting a snide series of messages from Vriska about how long it took you, which means it takes a few scans of the message for it to register and your heart to freeze solid in your chest.

— apocalypseArisen [AA] has started trolling twinArmageddons [TA] —  
AA: s0llux  
AA: help  
AA is offline!


	26. Chapter 26

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry about the mini-hiatus, especially with that cliffhanger! If you don't follow me on Tumblr, it was because I had a hellish assessment period at uni, and also moved. But! We have a chapter now, and you're getting it at the same time as Tumblr for once because you have waited so long and cannot possibly wait any longer.

You lose yourself again.

This isn’t like after Eridan died. You were bereft, then, and detached yourself so you wouldn’t have to feel the ramifications of his death, have them tick away in the back of your mind. This is detachment, too, but it’s detachment that rips you away from yourself and leaves you howling, no corner of your mind held back to snidely comment on how much of a fuckup you are.

It doesn’t matter that you’re a fuckup. It doesn’t matter that Eridan is dead. All that matters is Aradia needs your help and _you can’t help her_.

Karkat is the one who finds you. Well, Karkat and Terezi, but Karkat is the one who jumps off Pyralspite’s back to tackle you out of the air, sending the both of you plummeting until Terezi’s lusus snatches you from the jaws of a messy death - you being too busy attempting to rip Karkat apart to stop the two of you from hitting the ground. He wrenches at your horns, swearing indiscriminately at you and the power you’re whipping around, until the resultant soothing chemicals knock you on your ass for him.

“What the _fuck_?” Karkat snarls at you, at arm’s length since he got one furrow down the side of his face from you and likely doesn’t want another. “Are you trying to commit suicide, you magnificent shitstain? What fucking _possessed_ you-”

You seize his jacket in shaking hands. “Where’s AA?”

He frowns, and almost absently works your hands free. Finally he says, resigned horror dawning, “I’m going to go out on a limb and guess ‘not back at the fucking caverns where she should be’?”

You fish your palmtop out and shove it at him. “What the fuck is this, KK, where is _my moirail-_ ”

“Take it down a notch,” Karkat says, and tugs at your horn again. It’s a utilitarian, uninvasive-as-can-be gesture, designed to get the most amount of soothing out of the least weirdness, and it makes you feel sick. Sick enough that you vomit in his lap without warning, although most of it is dry heaving. He curses anyway and shoves your palmtop in his mouth in order to get both hands on your head, thumbs digging into your temples. You whine - it’d be a shriek, but your body is catching up with you and your throat _hurts_ \- and he says, “Fuck _me_ ,” with amazing clarity given that he can’t move his mouth.

Terezi slides down Pyralspite’s back and takes the palmtop from Karkat’s mouth, wiping it off on her sleeve before licking the screen. “Ah,” she says, after a moment, all emotion drained from her voice. “Yes, that would explain it.”

You pull on Karkat as much as you can, with your shaking, weak, lightheaded-all-over body. “KK-”

“I don’t know,” he says, the three flat words echoing in your head. “I saw your lightshow and followed the path of destruction.” Despite the harsh blankness of his tone, his hands stay on your head, and only when one of his thumbs dips down to wipe your face do you realise you’re crying. Your head _hurts_ , it hurts more than after you used the mind honey and you can’t think past it, and only the painful circles of Karkat’s fingers - practiced over sweeps, you’ve known him long enough that he knows what to do for you in a migraine, and that hurts too - exist in your world.

You heave again and Terezi shoves a flask in your hands, unscrewing the cap. The instant the water - tepid, flat, metallic - hits your lips, you chug half of it without noticing and stand up again, the wind from Pyralspite’s flight nearly whipping you away and stinging at your skin. Your burns have gotten worse; you must have been flying since before the sun set, and you don’t remember and you don’t _care_. “I have to-”

Karkat stands up too, balancing more carefully on Pyralspite’s back, and jerks your head around until you’re facing the way you came. Smoke rises along a thin, straight path - unnaturally straight, the edges cut with a ruler. You can look along it with no obstructions - not the forest, not even the hive that used to be in the way, and is now two hives - and from far, far back, black smoke is still rising into the air. The kind of smoke you get when a wet forest burns to the ground.

“You’re not going to fucking throw your body on the pile,” Karkat says once you’ve had a moment to drink the results of letting you off the chain in. The same jagged edges that have been under your skin since Eridan died are in his voice. “You’re going to sit the fuck down, drink the rest of Terezi’s water, and we are going to find Aradia and keep everyone _alive_. Are we clear?”

Your knees conclude the argument by giving out, and your brain decides to skip the rest of Karkat’s lecture by having you pass out.

—

You wake up in darkness, with muffled sound pressing in on you from all sides. Your head is in someone’s lap, and their fingers press into your temples in slow circles that you focus on. Some of the sound recedes, slightly, and then you manage to croak out, “KK.”

“I thought you were dead,” he says, as flat as before. “You gave yourself a fucking fever like some swooning damsel in distress from those shitty psionic flicks you banned us from watching.” When you try to crawl upright, he shoves you back down. Shit. Either he’s put on muscle or you’re exactly as wobbly as you feel. “We’re _on it_ , you colossal, disgusting idiot. As hilarious as it would be to watch you crawl your way down the hall and pass out again, you’ll get trampled and I’ll get to explain the new rug.”

Everything about him is… off. As off as you feel. “Get your hands off me,” you say, and smack at one of his hands to make your point. He ignores it completely, so you grit your teeth and pull at your psi, even though using it like this is a recipe for pain. “Get _off_ me, you’re not-”

“Maybe she’s dead.” His voice snaps like a whip, and you flinch. He bares his teeth, too unkind to be any kind of smile. “Guess what? There are problems that we can’t fix by leaning prettily against the flogging jut and batting our eyelashes! Eridan is dead, and maybe Aradia’s dead, and maybe we’re not a quadrant but you are about to get another thought lodged squarely up your ass if you think I’m going to let you go out and kill yourself and-” he cuts himself off, biting down on the words, the spark that was in his eyes dying again. “You’re staying right the fuck here until we can figure out where she is. Got it?”

You stare up at him, the unfamiliar planes of his face devoid of any hint of expression, and wonder which of you wins the race to the bottom and gets to claim the title of Most Broken. After a long moment of silence, you tell him, “I’m not leaving you.”

It may be the most unkind lie you have ever told. He nods, regardless, and says, “Go back to sleep.”

—

Kanaya’s voice wakes you up, this time. Karkat’s hands are still steady in your hair, never straying too far from your horns. You’re dangerous, and never has it been more obvious than having Karkat, who is important now and has a thousand obligations and probably hates looking at you and being reminded of his dead matesprit, grubsitting you because he’s the only person left you’d accept having this power over you.

“Tell them to get fucked,” he says, pleasant, in hushed tones you didn’t think he was capable of. He must not want to wake you up.

Kanaya sighs, her glow obvious even through your eyelids. “Karkat-”

“No.” His hands comb through your hair, never faltering.

“You _can’t ignore this_ ,” she hisses at him, still trying not to wake you even though she’s clearly at the end of her rope. It’s almost sweet. “Sollux’s situation is alarming, but there are twenty _thousand_ other trolls depending on you.”

You haven’t opened your eyes, since the last thing you want is to get mixed up in this, but you don’t need to be able to see to know the expression on Karkat’s face. “Telling me not to ignore something? That’s fucking rich.”

The silence thrums in your bones. Finally, Kanaya hisses out, “I made a mistake. Is that what you want to hear? However ashamed you believe I should be, I assure you-”

“I get it,” Karkat snarls, still trying to keep the volume down. He has to realise you’re awake, but you’ll both keep the pretense going. Assuming you’re at the brooding caverns, there’s little opportunity for privacy. “I’m a walking mistake and I made it worse by shoving my foot in it, but it’s still a bit fucking much to sanctimoniously inform me that _ignoring things makes them worse_.”

There’s another long silence. Then the blur of light that is Kanaya crouches down, and she says, “I’m sorry.” It’s clipped and grating, but honest nonetheless. Karkat doesn’t reply, and she exhales. “Karkat, I- I don’t want to fight.”

More silence. Karkat’s breathing is as even and steady as the rest of him, which is a far cry from the Karkat who used to flip his shit over anything that crossed his path. “Me neither,” he finally says, resigned. “We fucked up.”

Kanaya’s laugh is choked. “Yes. That would summarise the situation.” There’s a shuffle, which is probably Kanaya getting more comfortable, and then she says, tentative, “I don’t hate you.”

Karkat shrugs, the motion upsetting the rhythm of his hands. “So what happens next?”

You crack open an eye. Kanaya has her head buried in her hands, a hook of a pained smile the only part of her face visible. She takes a moment, then lowers her hands. “What happens next is that I really do mean you’re needed. Rumour is starting to spread that something happened to you while you were gone.”

Karkat pats your face, too abrupt and heavy to be a pap. “You can stop dodging the awkwardness now, asshole. Are you going to set the world on fire if I leave you alone for five minutes?”

You open your eyes, look up at him. You’re processing the words, but most of you is still gone, nothing but rage frothing under the surface. You’ve already set the world on fire, and you’ll do it again the instant you have the slightest reason, and it must come through in the blankness of your expression.

“I’ll be fine,” you say, before he can break himself in two trying to fix you and the Alternian Empire at the same time. It’s not even a lie. In the interests of cutting any protests short, you push yourself upright, out of his lap and away from his hands, and he lets you go.

You automatically reach up to adjust your glasses, and let your hand fall when you realise they’re gone.

“Would you like me to stay?” Kanaya asks. She has deep, unhealthy circles under her eyes, and her glow is sallow and smothered, now that you look at her more closely. When you shrug, she leans back against a wall and tucks her legs under herself, her shoulders sagging with relief at the small reprieve.

Karkat stands up and grabs your shoulder, squeezing it tight for a fleeting instant. Then he’s gone, and the remnants of the migraine he was holding off with his sheer stubbornness start pounding at your skull again.

Kanaya observes you like she’s ticking boxes on a Symptoms of the Grieving and Insane checklist in her head. “So…”

“KN,” you say, your voice rusty and weary and your throat on fire, “just take a break.”

—

Your head gets a little clearer when you dig one of the dry-as-dust energy bars you always carry out of your captchalogue deck and set to the task of chewing on it. You’ve been going in circles ever since this coup started, thinking of all the ways it could go wrong. Everything _has_ gone wrong now, but the one upside of the situation is that you now have a clarity of purpose you don’t think you’ve ever experienced before.

The good thing about being you is that nobody can stop you, if you don’t want to be stopped.

You eat three of the bars, which stops your hands shaking. Kanaya is still watching you, although she hasn’t said anything; you slip into the small ablutionsblock beside the one you’re in, run the water, and slip out the door to the next connecting block after slicing through the lock. You end up in the middle of about six other trolls, but are out of that room before any of them can get pissy about it.

Finding your way out is harder. You’ve never been paying attention in here, and if there are twenty thousand trolls in the brooding caverns - fuck, you thought there were five thousand or so at most, twenty thousand is a hard number to fathom - the caverns are bigger than you thought. You’re known, though. More known than you’d be comfortable with, otherwise, but being known as the Helmsmen guy means that your questions get answered and you don’t have to slam people out of your way in the narrow, twisting paths.

The sun’s only been set for a few hours, you realise, when you climb out to surface. It should give you more than ample time to do what needs to be done.

—

You land at Equius’ hive with practiced precision, walk down the stairs like you always have. He’s there, like always, looks up at the sound of your footsteps on the staircase like always. Before he can delay you with platitudes or polite concern, you say, “Which relays did the message bounce through?”

On the way over here, after you dropped by your hive and cleared it out of anything useful, you checked the rudimentary logs your palmtop version of Trollian logged. The protocols Trollian uses mean that the path a message takes isn’t always the most straightforward, though, and everyone’s been using your encryption ever since this all started. As useless as Karkat has always been with anything approaching real coding, he still would have known to send the logs to Equius while you were asleep, and he did tell you that he was on it. If Equius has done any of the work already, it’s less in the way.

You’ve been ignoring it, because there’s nothing else you can do, but it’s been a full night and day since Aradia messaged you, and there have been no messages since. No messages, and no sign of Vriska, and you are ignoring it in an entirely different way to your methods of skating around the fact of Eridan’s death.

“Here,” Equius says, after an appreciable measure of hesitation. He’s been working, apparently, has painstakingly mapped out every fake route your encryption has laid in front of him, every timestamped log from every relay you’ve bothered to worm your way into.

You lean over his shoulder to look at the screen, then take the mouse and delete a wide swathe of the routes that use relays that you made up. After that… fuck, Aradia’s as psionic as you are, there’s not much of the world you can’t get to depending on how hard you push. You chew your lip, then shake your head and delete the ones that don’t have any relays near where you were anywhere in the route. From there, the only routes left have a few node clusters - network hubs, some of them, but the rest are probably your best bet. There’s no way of telling for certain, but this way you can at least check multiple and improve your odds. The nearest cluster will still be cutting it fine with sunrise, but you’ll burn yourself to ash one way or the other to get there, because you have to.

If Aradia hasn’t moved. If she’s not…

You take a photo of the map as the most direct method of getting it to your palmtop. That done, you turn and head straight for the stairs, only to be caught up on an, “I’m sorry,” from Equius.

Sympathy for your situation, regret about not being able to do more? You don’t care. Every moment you spend here is a moment taken from Aradia, and you’ve had the moments of her life drip away between your fingers once already. You have no time to waste on sentiment. “Someone should be,” you tell him, and leave before you can get snarled up in any more concern.

—

You’re ruthlessly calm about the situation. In all of your obsessive, miserable planning for the future, all the paths you could have taken, there was always going to come a time when you’d have to either throw yourself forward or burn yourself out. You’d never decided which it would be, really, your choice changing from upswing to downswing, but you’d never anticipated having a practice run, either. Now you know; your first response was to lose yourself and set fire to the world. You have more control now, though, and the response you choose is to keep moving and make it _right_.

Eridan died because of you. You can think that without flinching, because you’ve patched yourself back together into some semblance of functionality, responding to the state of emergency that is your life. Aradia…

Your kismesis had the right of it. You’ve always been half in love with your own doom, and this entire coup has been an exercise in getting over yourself for long enough to at least offer what you can. Eridan and Aradia and Karkat, Terezi and Equius, they’ve all steadily given you enough support for you to start breaking that down. If, after all that, Aradia has died because of you-

You don’t know what will be left of you if your new-found vulnerability scars over without her. You’re fairly certain you won’t like the results.

In any case, your flight to the first cluster of possible relays goes like clockwork, compared to your earlier rampage. Your hands shake a little after you land, and it’s done nothing to help your head stop feeling like someone’s taking an ice pick to it from the inside, but this over-extension is non-negotiable.

You thought finding Aradia would be harder.

It’s near enough to sunrise that everyone is inside, in the little collection of lawnrings that you land at. You weren’t sure what you were planning to do from this point, but it’s obsolete, given the thin plume of smoke you can see drifting into the air some distance away. It could be any number of innocent things, but you’d bet everything you own that it’s not. As you’re betting Aradia’s life instead, you’re even more certain. Gold light is already a thin line on the horizon behind you, though, and you know you can’t be of any help if you get killed by the sun.

It takes a solid minute of slamming on the door of the nearest hive for someone to answer. A blueblood, Vriska’s caste, gives you a gut-wrenching shock when they finally yank open the door, scowling. “I don’t know you.”

“Sopor,” you order, looking back at the horizon.

The blueblood sniffs. “I don’t care what your name is. You’d better have a good reason for being on my doorstep at dawn. If my neighbours get angry-”

“ _Sopor_ ,” you say, stressing the _S_ this time. “And tell me what that smoke is.” Before they can protest, you shoulder your way inside with a crackle of power, snatching away the long knife they were hiding behind the door. They’ve got a pretty typical blueblood hive, so you start marching down the hall, opening doors and sticking your head in to see if any of the rooms have a cupe in them.

The blueblood’s gotten very quiet since you took away their knife and shoved them around with psionics. Most psionics couldn’t beat a wet cat in a fight - their talents lie elsewhere - but there are the ones like you who people learn to be wary of all psionics from. Eventually, they say, a lot of the arrogance stripped out of their voice, “The spare sopor’s in the upstairs respiteblock.” Without the arrogance, caution comes through. They’ve decided that they’re just fine with the crazy guy asking for sopor so long as he’s not actually attacking. “And I don’t know about the smoke. There was a huge bang about a day ago, and I guess something’s been burning ever since. No evacuation orders, though.”

You nod and head upstairs. The first door you open is the spare respiteblock, plastic bags of sopor stacked up neatly in the corner. As the blueblood watches, having followed you helplessly upstairs, you tear one open and start smearing the contents in a thick layer along your arms and up your neck. “Long-sleeved shirt,” you say, brisk, hoping to keep them off-guard enough that they keep doing what you tell them to. When they come back with it, you pull it on directly on top of the layer of sopor on your skin, after rolling down your pant legs over the layer you slapped there. When you rip down one of the blackout curtains, the blueblood makes a noise of protest, so you let your eyes spark as you wrap it around your shoulders. In the window, the pale strip of dawn is widening. The sopor over your arms and legs is already making you sleepy, but it and the blackout curtain should give you just enough protection to get to whatever’s causing the smoke.

“Hey, are you that-” the blueblood asks, but by then you’ve shoved open the window and jumped out.

—

You crash into the body of a burning ship half an hour later, your blackout curtain stifling and your skin irritated even through the sopor coating. It’s another of Vriska’s ships, more modern and less damaged than the others, even with the hole you tore in the side to get out of the sun. There’s a faint haze of smoke inside, enough to sting your eyes, although whatever’s burning seems to be above you and not so much something to worry about, since the metal of the ship isn’t going to carry the fire to you. Since you’re well and truly not going anywhere else until the sun sets, you start heading downwards, like this is just one more job to get Vriska off your back.

When you open the door to the Helmsblock - functional, for once - a small, thin figure in Vriska blue stops you short. She’s laid out on the floor, blood smudged along her hairline, her hair in curling tendrils across the floor. Her prosthetic arm hangs loosely from a gash torn in it, and only the slight rise and fall of her chest tells you that she’s even alive. The thin, acrid smoke is starting to invade the room, so you step forward and hook your arms under hers to pull her out. For all she’s as scrawny as you are, she’s heavier than you expected. As you pull her along the floor, you think you hear something and turn your head-

-and unbearable pressure bears down on you. For a moment you think you’re drowning on dry land, that the air you’ve been breathing has been a lie all along. It’s worse than when Feferi took you down to Gl’bgolyb, worse than any migraine you’ve ever had. The pressure starts in your horns and pushes through your jaw, makes you collapse to your knees next to Vriska and gasp, coughing and choking on nothing. Only after pressing your hands to your chest do you realise that you _are_ breathing, and then you realise what the pressure is. In a sudden moment of clarity, you’re more afraid than you’ve ever been in your life, because you are one of the most powerful psionics in existence and the sheer presence of the psi crushing you dwarfs anything approaching a reasonable scale.

Now you know what it feels like to have a universe smack you in the face. If this is what happens whenever you start spilling psi everywhere, you feel sorry for your neighbours.

It doesn’t stop. You brace your hands against the floor and draw in one ragged breath after the other, focussing on nothing more than the feel of your lungs expanding and contracting. The feel of someone stronger than you won’t recede, a steady force threatening to squash you flat, so you focus on ignoring it instead. With all the practice you’ve gotten at ignoring things, lately, it’s easier than you thought it would be. That done, you grab Vriska’s shoulders again and look to make sure you’re not going to trip over anything.

You get stuck halfway through. Something in your mind cracks, and you’re standing face to face with your worst nightmare. _Aradia_ , Aradia is in the _helm_ , wires following neat paths into her body as she stares, unseeing, at the wall. “AA?” you force out through numb lips as your brain tries to piece together the scraps you’re giving it and comes up blank. If she’s in the helmsblock who knocked out Vriska, it’s been two days and a night since you first got a message asking for help and Vriska should have woken up-

“Fuck,” Vriska snarls, her eyes snapping open. Before you can react she’s fisted her good hand in your shirt, and she drags you down to viciously headbutt you, the resultant crunch setting off an explosion of pain in your nose. Reeling from the blow and the still-present psi blanketing the world, you stumble backwards, trying to find your feet and failing miserably. Vriska rakes at your mind, and now that you feel her fingers in you, you realise that she led you here with a gentler touch than she ever let on she could use. When that grasp fails, she pushes herself upright. Her uninjured hand steadies her prosthetic arm as she staggers towards you. “Sorry about this, Captor,” she grits out, wincing whenever she steps with her right leg and jars her hip, “but irons in the fire. You know how it is.”

You try to gather your scattershot focus, but before you can, Vriska slams a foot into your ribs, letting out a gasp of pain as her foot hits the floor when she limps after you. You reach back with a hand to push yourself up, something in your side stabs, and you swear as you flinch, your focus collapsing again.

“One thing I learned, FLARPing to feed my lusus,” Vriska grits out, her dice appearing and falling around her. A short sword appears in her hand and she twirls it, letting her ruined arm dangle at her side. “Psionic nerds never bother learning how to fight.” When one of your hands clenches into a fist, she backhands you with the flat of the blade. There’s an explosion in the distance, but at this point you feel pretty detached from anything happening in the real world. All there is here is you and Vriska, the mockery she’s made of the moirail you should have left before this had a chance to happen, and the fact that you’re out of options.

Calmly, you reach up and wipe the blood off your face, look at the yellow smeared on your fingers. You can’t get your psionics together for shit, now, and the both of you know it. Your head’s too rattled, and there’s the fucking _presence_ hanging over the planet. Vriska’s no raw psionic, but her powers come from the same place, and she must feel it too. She knows you’re down for the count.

She doesn’t shift out of her painful ready stance, of course. The line of her shoulders and hips is tense, her face grim and wary, her wrist loose. You drop your hand and she doesn’t shift, but some of the tension goes out of her. You could come back from this, probably, but the both of you know that you won’t.

Aradia. _Fuck_. You’ve failed at the only thing that was ever important to you, and yet again, someone you love has paid the price. You- can’t even look at her, can’t breathe. Maybe if you’re lucky Vriska will abandon this plan and the two of you, and you can burn to death with oily smoke clogging your lungs. It would be kindest, at this point.

“Why?” you ask Vriska, your voice amazingly steady considering the circumstances. “Why me?”

Vriska laughs, bitter, and moves her weight onto her uninjured leg. “It’s never been about _you_ , Captor.” Her eyes flick to Aradia in the helm, and she resettles her weight again, her grip on her blade shifting. “This was a long time coming.”

It’s too loud. There’s the presence hanging over the planet, and the hundred thousand voices battering at your boundaries, the tide ebbing and flowing as the farthest reaches of the Empire die, more deaths on your hands. You can hear the crackle of the fire even though you shouldn’t, with how far away it is. Your heart thumps in your ears, the tremble of your hands a subtle counterpoint. Vriska’s breathing is harsh and pained.

At the centre of everything is a hum. It sounds like a thermal hull in another room, something so familiar that you’re only noticing it because you are where you are, and you’re about to die. It’s almost comforting, and you focus on it to the exclusion of everything else, propping yourself up against the wall. There’s no defiance left in you, but you manage to look Vriska in the eye nonetheless. “Fine,” you say, and watch her startle. “But you’re fucked now. There’s no walking away from this.”

She bares her teeth, prepared to drag things out to the bitter end.

The lights explode.

You bring your arm up automatically at the sound, sparing your face. When the glass is done raining down, you lower it again cautiously. Suddenly, you’re the only source of light in the room. Vriska is a shadow in one perfect wedge free of glass from the explosion, Aradia in the helm a horrifying silhouette. Then Vriska snarls and swings at you, just as the entire ship lurches. Her leg twists painfully under her and she crashes to the floor, taking the fall on her flesh arm and shredding herself in the process.

“Fuck you!” she howls at the helmscolumn, snatching up the sword again in a hand dripping with blood. You pick yourself up while she’s not watching, leaning heavily on the wall because your entire face is throbbing and you can’t think, and get closer while she’s occupied. Your ribs - a couple have to be broken, from the way you can’t catch your breath. It’s a problem that will have to be dealt with later, you decide, and ignore the dwindling possibility of there being a later.

You’ve ruined everything. This sort of ruination doesn’t get fixed by any sacrifice that will still leave you a _later_.

Some of the more functional fire alarms go off just as your foot crunches on some glass. You only have a split second until Vriska turns back to you, and after that - well, it’s a fifty-fifty chance that Vriska manages to control you, but Vriska’s luck means that you can’t count on anything. She snarls at the heart of the ship that used to be Aradia, her free hand going to her temple like she’s warding off a headache, and the alarms die away just as you reach the only piece of this that you can still affect.

As Vriska drops her hand and turns to you, you kick over one of her dice.

Her eyes widen as her sword disappears from her hand, and for the first time in your life, you see Vriska Serket afraid. The Octet won’t work for you, since you’re an arrogant piece of shit without a strife specibus equipped, but now Vriska’s on the same playing field. Bruised, battered, and down to whatever the two of you can bring to the table, she still has the upper hand - except she wants to live. Even now, she’s looking for a way out, and you gave up on finding a way out when you found Eridan sprawled across the floor of his hive and colder than even he should have been.

“This ends here,” you say, one hand bracing your ribs and little specks of power that are all you can pull together flaring around you. You’re so tired that it’s true, one way or the other.

She shifts into a ready stance, her eyes marking her dice. “It already has, dumbass.”

The two of you wait for the other to move, the tension smothering out what little air you still feel you can breathe. It sings when she surges forward, lunging at you before dropping into a skid towards the nearest of her dice, heedless of the glass still on the floor. You reach for your captcha deck as she rolls the die she got to, clicking the last of a circle of perfect eights into place. When the blue light clears, Vriska stands in front of the helmscolumn without a scratch on her. Her prosthetic arm is restored, although the model is different; her clothes would look like they were from a FLARP campaign if the leather weren’t scuffed and broken-in. When she smiles, it’s cocky and swaggering and there’s little of the Vriska you know in it.

“Well?” she says, and spreads her arms, the hooked sword in her hands catching the light. “Play whatever pathetic trump card you’ve got left, Sol! You want this to be over? Let’s _finish_ it.”

You close your eyes. Aradia - Aradia, who has always been the most gorgeous, optimistic, full of life person you’ve known - still hangs in the helm inert, and you can’t bear to look at her and what you’ve done. “Sorry,” you whisper, to anyone who might be listening. Then you pop the lid off the vial of mind honey you picked up from your hive and down it while the hollow sound is still echoing in the room.

You’d forgotten how sweet this stuff was.

—

Vertigo hits you as soon as you open your eyes, and you spend a good couple of minutes hacking up thin bile. You feel exactly as weak and drained as the last time this happened, and like last time, guilt and horror is what finally drives you to movement. When you try to push yourself up, you end up flat on the floor with white-hot pain before realising that you’ve burned away your own hand and halfway up your forearm - the one holding the mind honey vial. Once you’re done huddling in a ball like a grub and screaming in breaths that tear up your throat, you try getting up again, beyond caring about the angry, broken-open bleeding of your arm. Nothing as trivial as _you_ matters, at this point.

Cradling your arm, your ribs still hurting as much as they did before you passed out, you weave your way unsteadily over to the small, unprotected figure that is Vriska. She did her best to dodge, and she was lucky as she’s ever been. Fittingly enough, she’s lost her other arm and a leg, and her back is a raw mess that should make you sick, but doesn’t. It takes you a long moment, but you work up enough energy and lay a kick into her ribs, your own screaming at the motion. She doesn’t react, except to take a shallow, wet breath, and your shoulders sag in relief.

She’ll die without anyone to take care of her like you took care of Aradia, and nobody would want to save her at this point. She’s not walking away from this, and the fact that you aren’t either doesn’t register.

That done, you finally take a look at what you’ve done to your moirail.

The mind honey blast didn’t touch her, although it tore a hole straight by her and down, leaving layers of ship exposed with wire twisting away, and beyond that a smoking crater in the ground. The smoke and stink of melted metal and plastic leave you light-headed, but you grit your teeth and limp your way over to her anyway, the sharp throbs of all your accumulated injuries keeping your thoughts together. The psi presence is still there, but doesn’t seem as overwhelming as it did - probably because of how empty you are now, but it means you can keep going for a while longer.

It takes some effort to climb up into the tangle of wires with only one hand. You do it anyway, and then, out of options, start ripping away cables by the handful. They come away easily, even the bioflesh, and when you see the ports set into Aradia’s flesh you start laughing with an edge of hysteria, because she’s _detachable_. Vriska took your own fucking plans and -

You limp away as fast as you can in order to have a case of the dry heaves, having already vomited up anything that had ever been in your stomach. Then you grimly wipe your mouth on your sleeve and climb back into the wires, ripping them all away handful by handful with your half-missing arm hooked around a bundle of cables to keep you from falling. Getting her down is an undignified process, with your lack of psi, but you manage to lay her down in the corner furthest from Vriska before collapsing to your knees in a dizzy mess.

The problem with having a robot for a moirail is the difficulty in telling if she’s still alive. She’s her own emergency crash unit, and most of her organs aren’t organic, to boot. And, well, knowing your luck and Vriska’s…

You fist your remaining hand in her stupid, stupid bodysuit and clench your teeth as a sob wracks your body. Then, with nobody here to watch you, you press your head against Aradia’s stomach and scream. It turns into a wail halfway through, and then another, and you keep going until the only thing that punctuates the silence is the occasional hiccough from you, and the soft whir that is what you’ve done to the first person who ever trusted you enough to not do what you’ve done.

“I’m sorry,” you tell her, your voice catching. “I’m sorry, I’m- I’m so fucking sorry.” You let it spill out of your lips, a chant that might, if you try hard enough, make her open her eyes and - and tell you to fuck off, she’s not accepting this apology, so long as she _wakes up_.

Long hours later, when you can’t speak, and the whir of her remains uninterrupted, you slowly and painfully shuffle yourself until your head lays on her shoulder. You don’t deserve this stolen comfort, and it’s sick of you to take it, but you’re done. Something here will kill you: the smoke, your wound going septic, maybe even Vriska waking up and finishing the job, as unlikely as that is. But you’re _done_ , and you died the moment you saw her in the helm and understood, and at least you managed to end Vriska’s toxic revenge - even if it came too late.

You sigh, slip a last, “Sorry,” through your lips. Then you do what your body’s been begging you to do for a while now, and close your eyes.


	27. Chapter 27

You’d hoped for one last pleasant dream and then a quick exit. Instead, you get the most horrible mix of fond memories you’ve ever been assaulted by, each with an undertone of wrongness. Your first words exchanged with Aradia, tinged with loathing. Sleeping sprawled over your lusus after a fight, the inevitability of ending hanging over the both of you like a knife. All the quiet hours spent with Eridan - the scoff of his laugh, the slyness of the grin he wore when supremely pleased with something he’d said, his fins twitching in his sleep - all tearing holes in your heart until nothing is left. The moments you treasured and played off at the time sink razor claws into you, fill you with an ache that you can’t describe, and leave you unable to face the inevitable turning point of all your failures, dragged in for the real nightmare.

It doesn’t happen. All you get are truer-than-life reproductions of all the things you should have been able to save, which hurts more than any accounting of your failures could.

You’re not sure if you’re awake or asleep, alive or dead. There’s a hum, and a clatter, and when you reach out hours or days into it, Terezi locks cold fingers around your wrist, the lines of her face grave. “Sollux,” she says, her voice at right angles to the world you’re floating in, “what have you done?”

“Remember when we used to have fun?” you slur at her. “Before I loved you?” She doesn’t move, just draws in a too-quick breath. “I never said,” you tell her, because maybe this is something your brain has to chew through before you can just _give up_ , forever, and Terezi always deserved better than you too. “Thanks. For AA.” You try to pat her face, but your limbs weigh you down, pinning you to the bottom of the world. “Got Vriska,” you tell her, and hope it counts; you were always a poor auspistice. “Sorry.”

Terezi presses one hand to her face, her fingers dislodging her glasses and doing nothing to stop the tears falling down her face. “You should be,” she says.

Content, you let go again, and fall into a warm summer night you spent teaching Karkat about elseif loops.

—

“-moray fins to worry about, I might need - don’t look at me like that, there’s _two hours_ -”

“So you’re just going to fuck over everyone who got you here?”

“ _Karkat-_ ”

Bone-cold - _sea_ -cold fingers on your neck. You’re scourged clean from the inside out, the comfort of pretending at dreams torn from you. Nothing hurts, by the time you manage to reach up and grab the fingers touching you, when another cool hand presses against your forehead.

“FF?” you say, and open your eyes, facing the fact that you _are_ waking up with unsurprised, gloomy resolve. You’re in a block you don’t recognise - not Kanaya’s hive, not the rough walls of the brooding caverns, not Equius’ hive - with Feferi standing beside you and Karkat on your other side. For a moment you’re left with nothing _but_ the moment, Feferi and Karkat looking down at you as you push yourself up to your elbows, but then the peace shatters and you can see the wariness in their eyes, the silent tension of trying to figure out where you slot in now, and it all comes crashing down.

You try to reach out to grab Karkat, but are stopped by your own inability to. Generally a hand helps, if you want to grip things, and your arm ends in clean white cotton instead. Vriska mocking you, the pop of the cap of the mind honey vial, Aradia - _Aradia,_ strung up by your own artifice with nothing left of her but what you’d done-

Karkat saves you by grabbing your chin and looking you direct in the eyes, forcing you to keep his gaze. “Keep it together, shitlord,” he says, and the familiar words are a lifeline. “If you die tonight, I can guarantee it’s not going to be anywhere near as fun as anything you were planning.” He looks over your shoulder, back at Feferi. “This asshole and I need to have words.”

Feferi takes her hand off the back of your neck, and the chill in your blood dissipates. The feel of your body comes back with it, a twinge in your neck and the dull throb of what used to be your hand, the ache of bruises carpeting the side you had broken ribs on. _Had_ , because Feferi is a law unto herself. The overwhelming psionic presence blankets you again, not as smothering since you’ve drained every drop of psi you had in you and there’s nothing left of you to be impressed.

“Vriska,” you say, your voice harsh and dry.

Karkat laughs, bitter, and sits beside you as Feferi leaves, the door clicking shut behind her. “The problem that Vriska presents right now is so startlingly insignificant, Sollux, that your pathetic excuse for a logic gland would be flattered by the comparison.” When you don’t react, he sighs and loops your undamaged arm over his shoulders, pulling you along with him when he stands back up. Together, you make it to the window, and-

Curvature. Elegant, three-pronged lines blocking out the sky, filling it with Imperial red. The psionics sliding around your skin, inexorably pressing down on you. On the ground, the horizon dividing them from the Battleship Condescension, Karkat’s army all gathered in neat clusters, packing the widening rings of roads to what must be the Ascension shuttle landing sites. The scale is lost on you, numb as you are.

You’ve spent the last few seasons of your life fearing and feverishly preparing for this one moment. You’d run the numbers - you were _constantly_ running the numbers the whole time, calculating which of you would end up dead and which of you would end up worse. If anything, it’s a relief: tonight is the night you no longer have to be afraid for everyone you care about. 

“Not that Vriska isn’t a problem,” Karkat says, his voice flat. “For instance, it’s a problem when one of the most stupid people on the planet decides to chase her down on his lonesome and gets completely suckered into whatever traps she laid for him, making himself completely useless for anything that comes next.”

“Aradia,” you say.

“Eridan,” he counters. When you look away, his grip tightens on your arm. “We have been played like we are filthy fucking _casuals_ , Captor,” he says, his gaze fixed on the Battleship Condescension, unwavering. “They _knew_. There’s a strategy. I was attacked when Terezi and Kanaya were trying to deal with managing an army that was doubling in size by the night. Eridan was killed when he was fucked up from sleeping four hours a day, feeding Feferi’s lusus and tearing apart everything he could find for her. Feferi was dismissed as a threat until she couldn’t be ignored.” He finally looks at you. “And _you_. You gave yourself up to _fucking die_ in the middle of nowhere because they knew Aradia would be the perfect bait.”

You yank your arm away and immediately fall on your ass, still more off-kilter than you thought despite Feferi’s help. “She-” Your voice breaks. “KK, she-”

“She’s fucking _fine_ ,” Karkat snarls. You flinch, and he takes a swift step forward before crouching down to seethe at you better. “She was the one who filled us in, because the absolute fucking _disaster_ I hoped would have the decency to possess the _smallest amount_ of fucking courtesy known to trollkind who barely fucking _made it back_ was too busy dying of a severe case of idiocy to do so himself!” He grabs your shirt - clean, plain black; someone has been taking care of you - and hauls you closer, to hiss in your face, “You dumb _shit_ , did you ever fucking _think_ that I could keep this going without you and Eridan?”

You’re the one to look away, staring down at your knees. After a moment, Karkat’s hands relax in your shirt, like he hadn’t realised he was holding it.

You should cry. Karkat - the Karkat you knew would be crying, but here the two of you are, with nothing but ashes and regret and each other. You had looked forward to being dead for this, to not having to see the point of the revolution where your predictions turn into realities and everything you and yours have been working for exacts its costs.

You are twice the idiot Karkat thinks you are. He’s realised - he’s _processed_ the costs, already. You put it off, believing that everything would come due in one perfect eclipse of a moment, that everything you’d exacted against the Empire to keep yours safe - everything that has happened because of your actions, everything you can take on your shoulders - would be settled with your life and the balance would zero out. You wanted to _sacrifice_ , the other side of Vriska’s selfish coin, and skip out on the aftermath. 

All the grand gestures in the world, all the rescues and psionic fuckery, everything good you have managed despite yourself - you could do it again, night after night, and it wouldn’t fix a thing. 

You draw in a ragged breath, still looking at your knees, Karkat still crouched over you warily. “Does she…” you manage to say, before your throat closes.

Karkat rubs his face. “Unlike some, I am not, in fact, Aradia Megido’s moirail, and thus I am _amazingly_ unqualified to speculate as to what kind of a mood this spectacular carousel of bullshit has put her in regarding disasters in loosely troll-ish form.” After a beat, he adds with a touch of hesitation, “Feferi and I are making sure that none of you do anything stupid until there’s a culling fork through Condesce’s thoracic shield. We’ll get everyone together and sort it out then.” He presses a palmtop into your hand; open is a chat window with Terezi, with a truly impressive array of insulting messages telling you that Vriska is handled and Aradia is as safe as anyone can be, with the Battleship Condescension ready to land.

You’ve done a lot to tear your way through the world to Aradia’s side, the past few nights. Now, you just close your eyes and give Karkat a shallow nod. At this point, you wouldn’t trust you to keep your cool either.

—

Karkat doesn’t let you sit idle. One hour, he used, talking to you. The Battleship Condescension is estimated to land in another hour, and for all Karkat is your friend, he doesn’t belong to you. He belongs to these people, conferring with some, directing others, staving off a fearful last-minute collapse of the revolution with sheer determination as you follow him around at a loss as to what happens next.

Feferi appears out of the crowd from nowhere, with an easy, loping stride, shoulders back and chin high, and panic carefully concealed in her eyes. Karkat’s army is mostly lowbloods, all moulted long ago, and Feferi looks minuscule compared to them. She tilts her head at you, a silent question, and you shrug as she falls into step with the two of you.

Karkat squeezes her hand in what, to all appearances, seems to be actual pity. The panic in her eyes fades a little.

“What’s the plan?” you ask.

Feferi laughs.

“We’re going to make this as organised a catastrophe as possible,” Karkat says, gesturing curtly to a brownblood with carved horns. “Aradia, Terezi, and Kanaya are each overseeing a quarter of the crowd. If Feferi wins, we don’t want the Battleship stampeded. If she loses, they’ll do what they can to direct what happens afterwards.”

“Everyone else?” you ask.

Karkat looks upwards briefly, beseeching, before looking back to you. “Vriska. Just because we have decided that _killing Her Imperious Condescension_ is the more pressing problem does not mean we are going to let Vriska escalate her bullshit again. Quit digging.”

It takes half an hour to walk through the crowd, and not because Karkat keeps getting stopped. Each interruption only takes a second, and he rarely actually stops walking - or slows down. Feferi is nearly ignored, compared to him, the path she carves through the masses silent and hesitant. You follow in their wake and pretend that you don’t see people looking at you.

The work that Kanaya and Terezi have put in, organising everything as quietly and inconspicuously as possible, comes through in force as you walk past more people than you have ever seen in your life. Everything slots together - the ranks may not be neatly lined up, but there are clear paths to follow, and from who Karkat talks to, clear chains of command. Everyone is where they are supposed to be, and that, more than anything, impresses on you how absent you have been for all of this.

You collapsed the Empire with the Helmsrig. Karkat, Kanaya, and Terezi have put in long, hard hours to make sure that a new foundation exists to build on.

The three of you reach the frontline, nearest the landing zone, before you think to ask, “What am I doing here?”

Karkat looks at you, baffled. Feferi understands immediately, though, and laughs. It’s not unkind, although it’s not kind, either. “You’re _known_ , Sollux,” she says. “I’m the Heiress, and Karkat’s the mutant fighting nobly for equal rights, but you’re the one who made it so that their lives are never going to be what they were.”

Suddenly it feels a lot like twenty thousand people are staring at you.

“Sollux,” Feferi says, and your gut twists. She looks up at the vastness of the Battleship Condescension, more intimidating by the second, and smiles. “I don’t think any of us are ever going to forget the ways we fucked up, doing this.” The threads of fuchsia in her eyes catch the light, what little there is this far from the light pollution of any lawnrings. “But you’re here with us because you deserve to be. If we pull this off, we couldn’t have without you. And if not…” She pulls her trident out of her strife deck and plants it in the hard-packed dirt, her calm stance finally reaching her eyes. “They’re never going to forget _us_.”

—

The Battleship Condescension lands. To your surprise, there is a distinct lack of mass fleeing, although you imagine it has something to do with everyone being packed in so tightly that it may be an impossibility, at this point. Feferi leans on her trident and watches the ship as long minutes pass, you and Karkat behind her, an unnatural hush blanketing further back than you can see. With the ship right there - in _front_ of you, you could touch it and it blocks out the horizon and it still doesn’t feel real - the same psionic presence that has had you next to useless has started to affect anyone with even a grain of psionic power to their name. It’s not quite bringing the army to its knees, but it’s levelling the field. The only reason you’re still on your feet is because you messed yourself up so thoroughly fighting Vriska. 

You wonder how Aradia’s doing.

You don’t know what you expected of the Condesce. You know what she looks like, of course, but when a ramp lowers from the Battleship and a lone figure walks out, you - you don’t expect what she is. You didn’t think she’d come alone, with the army facing her, but nobody follows her down the ramp. Deliberate steps, unhurried stride - _Feferi’s_ walk, refined by more sweeps than anyone can count. Feferi’s horns, Feferi’s shape, Feferi’s hair, Feferi’s weapon.

She stops at the halfway point between the two of you, plants one end of her trident in the ground, and leans on it exactly as Feferi is leaning on hers. It’s then you realise that it’s at least partly deliberate, her playing up the similarities to goad Feferi. Even as far as you are, you can see the curve of her lips, self-satisfied. 

The Condesce. _Her Imperial Condescension_. One woman, if you can ignore the Empire behind her.

Feferi sighs and picks up her trident. “Here’s where we find out if I’m good enough.”

“If you like your metrics to be composed entirely of stupid fucking standards.” Karkat chews his lip, looking at Condesce, measuring her and finding her wanting. “Here’s where we find out if you kill her.”

Feferi summons the bravery for a laugh from somewhere. Without apparent thought or effort, she takes the first step towards her Ancestor, then the next. When she’s a few paces off from you, she turns, and raises her trident in a salute. It could be to Karkat, it could be to the army, it could be to Alternia itself for all you fucking know, but it changes something. The army grows anticipatory, instead of resigned, and you can almost _feel_ the hope taking root as mutters start passing through the crowd.

She looks small, next to her Ancestor. She barely comes up to the Condesce’s armpit. She stops out of striking reach of Condesce, every line of her body wary and proud. You’re too far away to hear the words they exchange, but considering everything that has happened, you don’t imagine the words themselves matter too much. This was always going to happen.

There’s no warning, no formal drawing of battlefield, no agreement on rules and polite salute. Condesce just snaps out of her casual lean, sweeping her trident up into a low strike at Feferi, and Feferi blocks it with a ring of metal-on-metal that echoes further than it should. The susurrus of whispered commentary builds into a wall of sound behind you, but all you can do is watch, Karkat unblinking at your side.

Condesce fights like breathing - like the breathing of someone who knows she cannot drown, that her being unable to breathe is an impossibility. There’s very little refinement to her movement, but a lot of backhanded tricks - she tears a line along Feferi’s cheek with a nasty feint that switches back into a slice, the brightness of Feferi’s blood stark enough to see against her skin even from so far away. The gap in skill seems insurmountable - Feferi doesn’t have the strength or stamina of Condesce, doesn’t have thousands of sweeps of practice - but then, with a deliberate, vicious step forward, Feferi slices a cut into Condesce in the exact same place.

_She’s playing_ , you realise, and you’re not sure if the thought is horrified or exultant. There’s a moment of silence as people process what just happened, a step behind you, and then a roar breaks out as Alternia realises its Empress can bleed.

Condesce reaches up and touches the cut, then looks at her fingers, heedless of the danger that is Feferi, or Karkat’s army. Feferi hangs back, cautious, and then-

Feferi is faster than Condesce, more flexible. You see her dash forward, hear metal scrape against metal, watch the two of them still again.

Condesce straightens up, stretches. Behind her, facing away, Feferi raises a hand to the tines of the trident piercing through her back, her own dropped into the dirt. Your brain sorts out the sequence of events - Condesce feinted, then lunged until she could stab Feferi from the back, one perfect move executed fast enough that it couldn’t be followed - and arrives at a conclusion even as you realise you don’t want one, as Feferi topples to her knees and fuchsia bubbles from her lips in a sick mimicry of Condesce’s painted-on smile.

Condesce doesn’t look at you, or Karkat as his hands fall to his sides, or the thousands of people who have come to see this play out and haven’t figured out what just happened. She doesn’t even look at Feferi. She leaves her descendant dying in the dirt, turns and walks back towards the ship.

Feferi, still somehow alive, reaches a shaking arm backwards until her fingers close around the haft of the trident. Blood pools below her, gushing out at the first tug of the trident she manages, and in the silence of the spectacle Karkat takes his first step forward.

The sound of twenty thousand people following him doesn’t even make Condesce hesitate. The sound of them stopping when Feferi throws up a hand doesn’t either. Feferi’s scream, a ragged exhalation she can’t help, as she yanks Condesce’s Imperial culling fork from her back, does nothing.

Feferi, slower than you have ever seen Feferi, pale and wavering and too small for the job that has been thrust upon her shoulders, plants Condesce’s trident in the ground and hauls herself upright hand over hand, her blood leaving fuchsia smears along the haft. She’s nothing but Imperial purple, blood on her hands and soaking her shirt and running down her chin. She died thirty seconds ago and hasn’t realised it yet.

Condesce freezes and turns around just as Feferi presses a hand to her chest, and light flares - _through_ her, knitting up the wounds she took from the inside out, leaving her bloody but untouched. 

_I took her life_ , Feferi had said. Your breath catches in your throat as Condesce drops into a low, lethal dash, as the first scattered shouts of ‘ _Heiress!’_ gather into a unified chant of disbelief and hope, _Heiress, Heiress, HEIRESS_.

Feferi wields Condesce’s trident like it was made for her, despite the difference in their sizes. Condesce is still a terrifying fighter, slipping inside of Feferi’s range every chance she gets, but the only weapons she has are tooth and nail, and every mark she makes on Feferi closes up again before it has a chance to bleed. Feferi ducks a kick, twists into a strike at Condesce’s side, slams the trident into a block from Condesce that has to break a bone.

Condesce shoves her back with her shoulder, pulls her arm straight with a snarl, and an oliveblood not five hundred metres from you drops dead. Her arm healed, the Empress of the Alternian Empire spreads her arms wide to Feferi, open and mocking. She says something you can’t hear and tilts her head back in laughter when Feferi doesn’t move.

“We have to pull back,” Karkat says, barely mouthing the words. Before he can tell anyone but you, Condesce starts stalking towards Feferi, and the ranks of psionics behind you start falling. “Fuck-”

Feferi screams in a voice that isn’t her own, eldritch rage and possession, and something _pushes_ at you. The life of something incomprehensibly old, all the potential Feferi took in, slams into the front lines like Gl’bgolyb herself, and suddenly Feferi is only Feferi - but the Feferi Peixes you know has always been a force to be reckoned with.

Condesce picks up Feferi’s culling fork. The deep slices into Feferi’s thigh that she scores when Feferi misses a dodge don’t heal. You barely understood what happened with Gl’bgolyb, what Feferi did when she healed Aradia, what she does when she’s more horrorterror than troll - but she took Gl’bgolyb’s _life_ , and now she’s spending it to keep the twenty thousand people Condesce is trying to drain the same way alive, you think, and there’s none left over for herself. 

The smaller trident is a deadlier weapon with Condesce’s muscle behind it, enough that Feferi has to scramble back to a defensive distance, deflecting one diagonal strike to her neck at the last minute and getting a slash along her arm as she staggers back again. Her arms fall apart a little as she loses her footing, and Condesce lunges into the opening. For the second time tonight, you see Feferi struck through by her Ancestor’s hand, but this time there’s nothing left to save her.

The tines bury themselves in the soft flesh above Feferi’s hip. Feferi closes her hand on the haft again, but this time she yanks towards herself, pulling the trident deeper.

Condesce stumbles.

Despite the pain, despite the blood loss, despite the strain that the battle of power must be adding, Feferi lashes back like she’s been saving everything for this moment. Condesce’s culling fork, wreathed in Imperial purple, pierces Condesce’s throat. Feferi yanks sideways with strength she shouldn’t have, _couldn’t_ have, snarls through the resultant spray of blood, and finishes the job with a twist of her shoulders that sends her sprawling when the resistance of Condesce’s neck runs out.

Feferi’s Ancestor, the Empress of Alternia - _Her Imperial Condescension_ , who may as well _be_ Alternia - crumples to the dirt, the wounds in her neck - the nearest thing to decapitation, in the most vicious way - not healing.

Karkat sprints out before you can grab him, leaving you to helplessly gesture at the rustblood that he spent the most time talking to in a way that hopefully conveys the need to not be stupid, before jogging after him yourself. Every step jars your arm and your still-sore ribs and makes you wish that your psionics weren’t enough of a fucking mess to make you afraid of using them. You get there long after Karkat has knelt beside Feferi, one of his hands cautiously probing the mess she’s made of herself.

“You left yourself open on purpose,” he says, making it sound more recriminating than any half-cursed lecture.

“Yeah,” she says, her voice faint. “It worked, too, so bite me, Crabcakes.” Her hand tightens on his and she looks up at him, her breath coming in gasps. “I don’t want to die.”

“You did a fucking great job proving that,” Karkat tells her, helpless and bewildered. “Can’t you-”

There’s movement from the Battleship Condescension and the ranks of Karkat’s army at the same time, the army surging forward in response to six people running straight for the three of you. Karkat’s on his feet in an instant, his arms thrown out as if he can hold the army back by sheer force of will - and maybe he can, because they subside, however ungracefully. What they’re for now, with Condesce dead and no need for an extended war, the lot of you will have to deal with later.

The first to reach you is a tealblood, with an asymmetric scythe of a horn and zero compunctions. She gives Condesce one unimpressed glance before crouching next to Feferi and Karkat. “Empress.”

Feferi laughs, then curls around the trident in her gut in pain. “Not for long.”

“If we can take you aboard the flagship,” the tealblood says, careful, “we can probably ensure your survival.”

Karkat scrutinises her. She stares coolly back at him, unfazed by both his mutation and status. Finally, Karkat pulls out his palmtop, tapping out the shortest message he’s ever written in his life as he says, “I go with her.”

“The army-” you protest, all too aware of how scrawny and vulnerable you are without your psionics. Maybe Karkat can hold an army back, but you’re not Karkat, and this isn’t your army. Whatever they say, you’ve mostly just been along for the ride.

“I’m bringing Aradia here,” he says, brusque. “They recognise her.”

The tealblood signals the five other trolls that followed her here. Two of them go to Condesce’s body, while the other three surround Feferi, edging you and Karkat out of the way as they begin doing their best to stabilise her. You move with a numbness, staring at Karkat, sickness sweeping out to fill every inch of you. “KK, I can’t-”

He jerks a thumb at the Battleship Condescension before turning back to Feferi, you vanishing from his world.

—

You spooked more trolls than you can count, getting lost in the Battleship Condescension, a stranger in their midst and a walking representation of the uncertainty of what happens next. You walk without thinking, at first, until you realise the path your feet are taking you on and turn back around, spooked by how close you came to walking straight to the helmsblock, still. After everything, and it’s _still_ your first instinct.

The tealblood finds you three hours later, the first person to not look at you like they’ve seen a ghost since you found a small space to hide away in. “Vantas wants you,” she informs you, barely looking away from a tablet she cradles in the crook of her arm. She leads you to a door, ignoring all the stares directed your way, and leaves you there without saying another word.

When you open the door, it turns out to be a small meeting room. Karkat is there. So are Aradia, Kanaya, and Terezi.

“Vriska,” Karkat says.

You step inside and let the door shut, breaking away from Aradia’s level gaze.

“Equius has patched her up enough that we have time to figure out what to do.” Karkat looks at Aradia, his expression grim. “We had her transferred into a psionic holding cell here. This is your decision.”

Aradia watches you - won’t stop watching you, and you think she’s going to ignore Karkat before she finally responds, “What do you expect me to do? Exact my revenge?” Her voice hard and sharp, she slices into you with words. “That’s gone _so well_ for me.”

Terezi, pale, wraps her fingers around the edge of the table. “Aradia-”

“Don’t ‘ _Aradia_ ’ me,” Aradia hisses, the sort of black rage you’ve only seen her in once or twice frothing to the surface. “ _What_ , Terezi? Am I supposed to take _responsibility_ for her?”

Terezi’s fingers tighten, until they should be digging gouges into the plastic of the table. “It’s not just us,” she says, then pauses and laughs. “It’s justice. It’s not - us, she took Sollux’s blueprints, _Feferi’s_ blueprints and forced them on you. The new helming process was supposed to restore autonomy, and Vriska has undermined everything about them. If people find out that you weren’t a volunteer…”

You get up and leave again, Aradia’s silent rage beating in your chest.

—

“Hey, Sol,” Vriska says, gesturing grandly with one arm. The other has a stump, clean white cotton to match your own. “Make yourself at home.”

A faint electric buzz and a wash of blue is all that separates you. These cells were made for holding psionics, the walls generated by the ship to negate and contain psionic fields. It’s almost a relief, being in here, shielded from the overwhelming feel of the ship. You press a hand against the wall that divides you from Vriska and watch it flicker.

Vriska leans comfortably against the wall, her head lolling back and eyes half-shut as she watches you. “I hear congratulations on the new Empire are in order,” she says, laconic. “Come to kill me to seal the deal?”

“Aradia doesn’t want to,” you say, toneless.

Vriska tilts her head. “You don’t want to, either,” she says, almost curious. “Guess you haven’t figured out how fucked you are.” All of a sudden, she leans forward, a fake and mocking smile baring her fangs. “I fucked you over, Captor. I fucked you over in ways you haven’t realised yet, because you’re so precious and broken, and you don’t even realise the _best_ part.” When you don’t react, she leans back again with a disappointed sigh. “Fuck, I thought you were meant to be smart. Think it through, if you have a piece of pan that isn’t sulking about how miserable you are. And when you figure it out…” Her eyes close, and she shifts her shoulders against the wall, getting comfortable. “It was never about _you,_ you fucking martyr.”

Despite the fact that you can’t face Aradia - can’t face up to what you’ve done - you’ve been pulling your pieces back together bit by bit ever since Karkat chewed you out. There’s enough of you to think _what does Vriska want_ , and from there it’s an easy step to questioning all of Vriska’s decisions, and then-

“ _There_ it is,” she says, when the last puzzle piece clicks into place. Her mocking grin turns real, savage. “So c’mon. Gonna let Aradia find out, or are you gonna solve the fucking problem?”

You’re already reaching for the switch that turns off the wall between you when Terezi whips into the room - smarter than you, knows Vriska better than you, knows that you’d be here and _knows_ what you just figured out - and whips her sword between you, the blade scoring a thin line across your neck. “Appleberry,” is all she says. 

“You can’t let Aradia talk to her,” you say to your auspistice, who hates you for your part in this as much as you hate yourself.

Terezi’s arm doesn’t waver. “Justice, Appleberry, not just us. You don’t get to decide how this ends.” She presses her lips into a thin line. “There’s not enough of us to make sure you don’t do something stupid before Feferi wakes up.”

You raise your arms carefully in surrender, the shock of one of your hands not being where you’d expect it to be still jarring, and take a step back from Vriska’s cell, then walk into the one beside it and sit cross-legged on the bench inside.

“Sollux-” Terezi says.

“It’s a good solution,” you say, cold and reasonable. “Vriska and I can talk.”

Vriska throws her head back to laugh, although in Terezi’s presence the laughter that mocked you sounds more hollow, empty of anything that makes her real. “Sure thing,” she says, and waves her own remaining hand at Terezi, the prosthetic cold and dull in the fluorescent lighting. “Don’t worry, Pyrope. I’m a gracious loser.”

Terezi look at you. “All you’re doing is making it more painful.” When you shrug, she seals your cell. “I’ll be back when Feferi wakes up,” she says, a hand pressed against the wall. It looks stranger from the inside. “Kanaya will check in on the cameras as often as she can.”

“We’ll be here,” Vriska says, and thumps the wall in a way that makes it reverberate. Terezi ignores her as she walks away, and the bitter look on Vriska’s face is nearly worth locking yourself in with her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's my birthday! I have a habit of giving fic to people on my birthday, and this year it's OLOH. Considering how far we've come from the hiatus, when I honestly couldn't look at this fic without feeling sick and guilty, it's amazing to realise that we made it, somehow. One more chapter and everything's over, and I am pleased to have marked this milestone with almost wrapping this monster up.
> 
> Thanks for coming and staying and reading, guys. I really do mean that. This fic wouldn't exist without you guys sharing it with me.


	28. Chapter 28

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, for [Fi](http://www.temporaldecay.tumblr.com), who deserves far more than just these words for how unfailingly she has supported me through all the ups and downs of writing this stupid, glorious mess.

You’ve gotten angry enough a few times in your life to hear the rush of blood in your ears, a tide dictated by the beat of your heart. You’ve never felt it with your temper sharp enough to cut diamond, but as seconds tick away without a word from Vriska, sitting aching and cross-legged on a bare metal bench, the distant sounds of a running ship echo in your ears exactly the same way.

Vriska doesn’t handle confinement well. It’s not that she’s impatient - she had patience enough to pull your strings, after all - but she is restless. If she could, she’d be pacing. As it is, she ignores you deliberately, trying to find a comfortable way to sit on her own bench, before giving up and leaning forward, propping her arm on her remaining leg. She matches you, in generic clothes and neatly-wrapped cotton bandages, and you wonder who spent their time looking after her. Feferi, obviously - she wouldn’t have survived without Feferi - but who cared enough to make sure she was more-than-stabilised? Affection is a resource that Vriska Serket tapped out long ago.

Normally \- if any corollary to this situation exists that could be called ‘normal’ - you’d wait for Vriska to get bored and start trying to dig her way past your carefully-cultivated apathy, playing the game and getting her to show her cards. For all that you’re still weary and want nothing more than to stop caring, Karkat’s reprimands are still seared into your heart and you’re fresh out of apathy.

“How long have you been planning all this?” you ask, breaking the silence. Your voice doesn’t come out anywhere near as cold as you want it to, but you doubt that matters anymore.

Vriska starts a little, on the other side of the blue-wash wall. The flicker of the field softens her silhouette a little, blurring the sharp lines of her features. When she smiles, it’s the first time you’ve seen her do so with her lips not painted cerulean since before the FLARP incident. You’re used to the brash image she projects, harsh and _loud_ , and when your brain makes the inevitable comparison to Eridan’s cape and the way that both have always hidden in their Ancestors’ shadows, you nearly flinch. 

“Irons in the fire, Sol,” she says, after a moment, looking back up, the bitter smile still there. “No plans. Some of us are just better at making our own opportunities than others.”

You lean forward, your ribs aching, and say, “Eridan.”

All the answer you need is in the tilt of her head, the way her smile shifts.

“Eridan,” she says, and leans back, resting her head against the wall. “I _was_ sad, you know.”

Your remaining hand balls into a fist. You’ve realised the disservices you’ve done to everyone you care about by locking yourself behind a wall of apathy, but it was useful, you must admit. Now you’re stuck with this - this _appropriate_ anger, this _healthy_ rage that doesn’t take you past the point of reason. “Yeah, you’re so fucking repentant-”

“Not repentant,” she says, her voice airy. You’d almost buy it if she wasn’t pointedly looking away from you, if she didn’t look so tired and small. “I was sad. But-” She focuses on you with a vengeance, leaning back in swiftly. “I thought about trying to get on your good side. I could have played that game and worked my way back into your good graces and you would have _died_ for me. You’ll throw yourself away on any lost cause.” She shrugs. “Too much work for not enough reward. Getting to that point would have required commitment to this.” She waves a hand at your surroundings - at the Battleship Condescension, paid for in blood. “Feferi shouldn’t have won. I needed options.”

It’s a pity you had the foresight to let yourself be locked away. “You killed Eridan,” you say, so precise that your lisp is barely a hiss, “to give yourself _options_.”

“That’s what I was talking about,” she says. This time, when she smiles, it’s gleeful and sharp, and you reprimand yourself for considering - again - Vriska Serket as anything but poisonous. Even locked away, even hurt, even with her guard dropped. “That’s one thing you never got, Sol. Irons in the fire? You don’t let them become chains in the making.”

—

— System message received —  
> H3Y  
> H3Y H3Y H3Y  
> N11111111C3 H4RDW4R3  
> Y0U 4R3N’7 3V3N 7H3 M0D3L R37R0F17 7H47 L177L3 5H17 PU7 0U7, 4R3 Y0U?? 7H15 H45 G0774 83 4 CU570M J08  
> N1C3 N1C3  
> G37 50M3 51CK FL4M35 N3X7  
AA: i d0nt kn0w wh0 y0u are  
AA: but if y0u d0nt fuck 0ff i will dev0te c0nsiderable eff0rt t0wards finding 0ut  
> 4W FUCK  
> 51CK FL4M35 700 74CKY?? MY 84D  
apocalypseArisen [AA] has turned off system messages!  
Administrator Override — [??]  
> N07 0N MY FUCK1NG 5H1P  
apocalypseArisen is an idle troll!  
> H3Y L00K 1M 50RRY, 0K  
> Y0U’R3 7H3 F1R57 H3LM5M4N 1’V3 833N 48L3 70 74LK 70  
AA: n0 im n0t  
> UH  
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> K1D??  
AA: i d0nt want y0ur stupid ship  
AA: i d0nt want tacky flames i d0nt want nice hardware i d0nt want s0me idi0t bugging me and i d0nt want t0 be here  
> W0W CRY M04R  
> WH47 *D0* Y0U W4N7 7H3N  
AA: i want  
AA: i want my life  
> W3LL 7H47’5 FUCK1NG 57UP1D  
> Y0U’R3 W4LK1NG 4R0UND 0N Y0UR 0WN 7W0 L3G5  
> 0N3 L3G 4ND M374L L3G  
> 7H3 54Y1NG FUCK1NG 574ND5  
> 3H3H3, 574ND5  
> 8U7 Y0U’R3 W4LK1NG 4ND 74LK1NG 15 MY P01N7  
> N080DY’5 57R4PP3D Y0U 1N70 4 5H1P 0R 5HU7 Y0U UP 4ND Y0U’R3 K1ND4 M0U7HY  
> 50M30N3 7HR3473N Y0UR F4M1LY??  
> Y0U D0 7H15 70 H3LP 50M30N3??  
> 1’M N07 5331NG WH47’5 K33P1NG Y0U H3R3  
AA: y0ure  
AA: y0ure the helmsman  
AA: arent y0u  
> Y0UR5 7RULY  
> 7RU57 M3 WH3N 1 54Y 7H1NG5 C0ULD 4LW4Y5 83 W0R53  
AA: fuck y0u  
> 1 G37 7H47 4 L07  
apocalypseArisen is an idle troll!  
> K1D??  
> WH3R3 7H3 FUCK 4R3 Y0U G01NG

\--

“Like fuck you’re ‘avoiding chains’ and ‘not planning’,” you say, complete with exaggerated finger quotes that get a scowl out of her. “You’re not avoiding _shit_. You could have disappeared forever after everything, no problem. You built all this elaborate bullshit with Aradia as a linchpin instead.”

Vriska sighs. “The resources-”

“Don’t give me that shit,” you snap, and get up to go stand near your shared wall. Vriska’s pretty much stuck in place, given her lack of leg, but you can still move, and if a conversation was ever going to make you need to pace, this is the one. Locked side-by-side, there’s very little either of you can do to control the conversation through aggressive control of space, but - you need to see if she believes the lies she’s spinning. You need to know that she knows what she’s done. “You played us and sold us out for some stupid favour from Condesce. Didn’t have anything to do with _helming Aradia_ with _my own fucking blueprints_. You did that for revenge.”

Without answering you, Vriska drags her leg up onto the bench she’s sitting on, twisting until she’s lying down and staring at the ceiling. “There’s a game that Aradia and I play,” she says, after a long moment. “Played.” Another pause, and then she sighs, and says, “We tested each other. I distracted her from getting the upper hand with her psionics, she got it anyway, then I’d get in her head - but that meant she won.” The neutral expression she’s wearing now that she’s not looking at you goes sour. “The setup was that she won, no matter what happened. Get it?”

All of the sharp tension drains out of your body, replaced by horror. It’s - you’ve been on the outside of how much the FLARP situation fucked your friends up, the ways it marked Terezi and Aradia. The physicality of it is one thing, but this - you can see Aradia snarling and hating her way through this dynamic, but only with Vriska, and you always knew their relationship couldn’t be healthy, but _this_ , there’s no way through that dynamic that doesn’t involve getting hurt.

You are, quite possibly, the worst moirail.

“But hey,” Vriska says, diffident. “I learned. So I set up plans for every contingency. Went around with Vantas so I could establish my cred with you guys if you came into power and I wanted to stick it out. Killed Eridan to destabilise things and prove I was worth keeping around to Condesce.” She yawns, and doesn’t bother to smother it, instead raising her hand and holding up a finger. “I helm Aradia, take you out of consideration because you can’t cut your losses, destabilise your coup attempt, Condesce wins. The favour I get from helping defeat that threat means she doesn’t look too hard for me when the dust settles.” She holds up another finger. “I helm Aradia, the coup succeeds somehow, I still get out in the chaos. If I need to, I can show up sweeps down the road with a plausible story about how we went missing and how tragically she died and cash in on the I Helped The Revolution status.”

“And it went perfectly,” you bite. She folds down the extraneous finger in order to flip you off. “Still not seeing why you chose Aradia.”

She turns her head to look at you in disbelief. “Yeah, you’re right! Out of the two psionics I had access to that’d buy me favour with Condesce to take out, I should have chosen the one I _can_ _’t_ mind-control.” She laughs. “I’m not _insane_ , Captor. Besides, I’d rather have you coming after me for vengeance than Aradia. You’re kind of useless.”

“Still got you here,” you say, even despite the anger starting to stir in your chest again.

“Couldn’t finish the job,” she counters. “If it was you in the helm, Aradia would have taken me apart.” She turns away again as you contemplate slamming your hand against the wall, like it would do any good. “Anyway,” she says, all pretenses at blitheness dropped, “whatever happens to me next, I win.” 

“Not revenge,” you say again, meaning it to be snide but having it come out hollow instead. 

“It wasn’t meant to come to this.” Vriska shifts, unable to get comfortable. Your heart bleeds with sympathy. “But yeah. Every contingency.”

You swallow past the sudden dryness of your mouth, but your next words still come out hoarse. “Do you realise what you’ve done?”

“Sure,” Vriska says, her tone lacking the flippancy her words try to provide. “What good’s destroying an Empire if you’re not the one to do it?”

\--

— System message received —  
> Y0U KN0W  
> 1’M PR377Y 5UR3 Y0U W3R3 74LL3R L457 71M3 1 CH3CK3D  
CC: T)(at joke MIG)(T work if I didn’t )(ave a different troll)(andle to )(er Condescension.  
CC: W)(o is t)(is?  
> 7H3 H3LM5M4N  
> D0N’7 G37 UP  
CC: Anot)(er )(ilarious joke. If you’re t)(e )(elmsman, you S)(OAL-ED be able to sea t)(at locomocean’s a bit beyond me rig)(t now.  
> C4P174L 7, C4P174L H, 7H4NK5. 1 W45 7H3 F1R57 H3LM5M4N, 17’5 MY FUCK1NG 717L3  
> 1 KN0W Y0U C4N’7 M0V3. 1 KN0W 1’V3 JU57 833N 537 UP0N 8Y 7H3 N3X7 G3N3R4710N. 1 KN0W 7H3R3 4R3 7W0 4NGRY K1D5 5N1P1NG 47 34CH 07H3R 1N 7H3 8R1G, 7H3R3’5 4 8L1ND G1RL 51771NG UND3R 4 748L3 1N M3371NG R00M 4, 7H3 GH057 0F 50M30N3 1 U53D 70 KN0W 15 RUNN1NG 4R0UND 4ND G1V1NG 0RD3R5 WH1CH 15 FUCK1NG H1L4R10U5 78H, M3M05 C0M1NG 1N 5H0W 7H3 R357 0F 7H3 UN1V3R53 15 1N D154RR4Y, 4ND 7H3R3’5 4 H3LM5M4N G1RL W4ND3R1NG 7H3 C0RR1D0R5 480U7 70 3XPL0D3 4ND 74K3 7H3 R357 0F 7H3 3MP1R3 W17H H3R  
> 50  
> WH47 4R3 Y0U G01NG 70 D0??  
> Y0U’V3 G07 50M3 3XC3P710N4LLY H1GH H33L5 70 F1LL  
CC: Are you offering to kelp me, or are you )(appy watc)(ing everyfin fall to pieces?  
> L177L3 0F C0LUMN 4, L177L3 0F C0LUMN 8  
> D3P3ND5 0N H0W 5H177Y 4N 3MPR355 1 7H1NK Y0U’R3 G01NG 70 83  
CC: Wait. W)(at’s wrong wit)( Araydia?  
> W3LL, 45 F4R 45 1 C4N 73LL, 5H3 G07 H3LM3D N0N-C0N53N5U4LLY  
> WH1CH 15 U5U4LLY 7H3 W4Y 17 G035, 3XC3P7 Y0U 574K3D Y0UR L1F3 0N 4 PR0M153 7H47 5H3 4ND 3V3RY 07H3R P510N1C 0F Y0UR G3N3R4710N W0ULDN’7 83  
> Y0UR N4M3 15 0N 7H15  
> 7H3R3’5 4 R3V0LU710N G01NG 0N 45 W3 5P34K. 0N3 M0R3 15N’7 G01NG 70 M4773R, 1F W0RD G375 0U7 4ND P30PL3 D3C1D3 7H47 7H15 8R0K3N PR0M153 M34N5 7H47 Y0UR 80DY G375 DUMP3D 1N 7H3 W4V35  
> 5H3 H45 7H3 P0W3R 70 3ND Y0UR R31GN 4ND 5H3’5 4NGRY  
> WH47 4R3 Y0U G01NG 70 D0??  
CC: W)(ale, call me crazy, but I fin I mig)(t try talking to )(er bes)(ore I let some bass)(ole needle me into deciding )(er life pat)(!  
CC: I don’t know you, I don’t trust you, and I don’t particularly LIK-E you. I’m knot going to pretend t)(at I’m knot an Empress. Halibut t)(e w)(ole point of t)(is is doing betta by the Empire, so Isle do t)(at, and you’re free to disapprove.  
CC: Isle )(ave someone researc)( the posseability of getting you out of t)(e flags)(ip as soon as t)(ere’s someone to spare.  
> WH47? N0!  
> FUCK 0FF, 7H15 15 MY 5H1P 4ND 1 C4N R07 1N H3R3 1F 1 W4N7 70

\--

You turn away from the wall, then lean back and sink down to the floor to sit against it. This is exactly as bad as you were imagining. “Fuck,” you say to yourself, staring down at your one hand in your lap with your brain slowly ticking into gear. You’re still not yourself - you may never be ‘yourself’ again - and you doubt you would have figured it out if you hadn’t seen the same thing writ large on the scale of an Empire. Your own efforts towards tearing down the Empire make you all too aware of how fragile it is.

Aradia is trapped. You’d grasped the edges of it from Vriska goading you, which is why you let yourself be locked away, but pulling it apart now - this is everything you never wanted for her. This is worse than her being locked away in a helmsblock. Like Terezi said, your helmsrig was supposed to give autonomy back to the psionic population of the Empire - and with Aradia as the first detachable Helmsman, she’s been forced into the ambassador role for it whether she wants to or not. And that…

You love Aradia. You have loved her through every single incident of her temper building up until it snaps. She has always been vicious about not giving an inch of herself away, and when something threatens that, she hits back hard enough to ensure that the problem doesn’t persist. Vriska has always been an exception to that dynamic, which is one reason everything escalated as much as it did. And Vriska has just escalated again, ripping away Aradia’s choice of what happens for the rest of her life. Worse than that, because Feferi will have to extort some promise of good behaviour out of Aradia - locking Aradia into the bitter, thankless task of advocating for her own cage, something she could never tolerate - or kill her. The results of Aradia talking, undermining confidence in Feferi - _fuck_. If Feferi wasn’t killed by some highblood opportunist, she’d be killed by Karkat’s army throwing a second revolution, angry beyond belief at the promises they’ve been fed being yanked out from under them. And there’s nobody who can step into power and keep it, at this point - maybe Karkat, but he’d be up against an Empire very used to not tolerating mutants at that point.

Even as angry as you were, you knew that Vriska couldn’t talk to Aradia, lest Aradia pull this apart and start getting angry enough to solve the situation the simplest way, spilling everything. Bile rises in your throat as you realise it’s more than that - if your revolution is going to get through this, Vriska has wrapped this up so that each and every one of you is going to have to be complicit in this lie. Every single one of you is going to be a hand clamped over Aradia’s mouth, chains locked around her wrists.

Revenge. 

“I never had the luxury of not dealing in blood,” Vriska says. Even if you wanted to, her tone is so blank that you can’t glean a thing from it, and you’re not about to turn around and hold a conversation with her while she’s ripping your soul into shreds. “I never had the choice to not make unpalatable choices.” She waits to see if she’s gotten a rise out of you, then sighs. “Fucking enjoy, Sol.”

You can’t bring yourself to reply.

\--

You’re not sure how much time passes after that. The near-inaudible hum of the walls is no way to keep time, and neither are the endless loops of logic you desperately try to tear through in order to find a different path, _any_ different path. You keep coming back to the same conclusions, though. For all that you believe in Feferi, you know she’s not naive enough to blithely excuse a threat to her Empire in the hopes that it doesn’t come back to bite her. An Aradia with this information set free to wander the Empire is a ticking time bomb of discontent. Even if you and Aradia contrived to disappear, Feferi couldn’t let you go. You don’t even _want_ that, particularly, and you don’t think Aradia would, either, after the dust settled. You’ve both - you’ve _all_ worked too hard to put Feferi in power to want it all to come crashing down again now.

You wish you both were six sweeps old again, before Vriska ever got tangled up with all of you. You wish you could take Aradia’s hand and run. You wish Eridan was here to tell you what an amazingly idiotic idea that is. 

You wish you didn’t know it would hurt Aradia more to know that Vriska put all of this on your shoulders, or that Vriska did so just to twist the knife deeper.

When the door hisses open, you look up, expecting Terezi, and get Equius instead. He draws up short at the sight of you, which you suppose _is_ alarming after everything that’s happened since you last saw him. The harsh light of the room means you can see the alarmed once-over he gives you behind his glasses as he says, “Sollux,” the horror he packs into your name making you guess that he didn’t quite say it intentionally.

“Finally,” Vriska says. Out of the corner of your eye, you see her swivel until she’s sitting on the bench properly again. “You got the replacement leg, Equius?”

Equius jerks back into motion, pressing the button that opens Vriska’s cell before stepping in and decaptchaloguing the pieces of a prosthetic leg. Vriska rolls up the cuff of her pants and starts unwinding the bandage around her leg, exposing the stump of her leg. It already has the interfacing band capping it, which surprises you, but better that than letting her leg heal and then cutting into it again, you guess. It makes about as much sense as the rest of the situation.

You turn to kneel and watch, suspicion creeping in around how rattled you are. “Why does Vriska need a new leg?” You meet her eyes unflinchingly. “There’s no fucking way she gets off the hook here.”

Equius’s shoulders curl inwards as he clicks the skeleton of the prosthetic home and picks up the first set of plating. Vriska, her eyes flat and a smirk curling up the corners of her mouth, luxuriates in your suspicion. “It hurts, Sol, that after all this time, you still think I’d be the kind of person who waits around to see if I get off the hook or not.”

“No,” you breathe, then slam your palm against the wall, “EQ, why the fuck are you _helping_ her?” Your voice catches in your throat as you realise, and your voice shakes a little as you let three words you hadn’t considered drop into the space between you. “Who helmed Aradia?”

Equius doesn’t answer.

“No,” you say, sinking back on your heels, your arms wrapping around yourself without you noticing. Who else would have known how Aradia worked intimately enough to be able to integrate her with the helmsrig? “No, fuck, _no-_ ” This is - you brought Aradia to his doorstep, you set this up, you were _played_. 

Vriska stands up on the skeleton of her leg and stretches, her metal hand pulling on what’s left of her arm as she twists. When finished, she crosses her open cell to crouch in front of you, her smirk blossoming into fully-fledged glee. “This part was kind of about you,” she confides, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear to show the scarred flesh near her prosthetic eye she usually keeps covered. “I really gotta thank you! Equius would never have helped me out if you hadn’t worried him so much.” 

“Vriska,” Equius snaps, unable to meet your eyes.

“Don’t help her,” you beg, over her shoulder. “I don’t know why you helped her fucking _helm Aradia-_ _”_

Equius slams a fist into the floor. It dents. Vriska’s eyes widen and she scrambles back a little.

“-whatever she had on you,” you continue desperately, “don’t-”

“Whatever she had on me?” Equius finally looks at you. You expected anger, the same barely-controlled temper you’ve been on the wrong side of before. Instead, you get bitterness. “ _She had_ a fool determined to throw his body on the pyre.” He swallows, compulsive, the way another person would grind their teeth. “Tell me you would not have volunteered to helm her ship.”

You stare up at him. “Fucking _never_ , EQ, what-”

“Wrong,” Vriska says, reclining on the bench, prosthetic skeleton crossed over her other knee, tapping the frame of her foot in impatience. When you jerk your gaze over to her, she rolls her eyes. “You’ve always been ready to hop in a helmsblock. I didn’t even have to do much!” When you fail to connect the dots fast enough for her liking, she groans. “One photo, Sol. You even posed.” She smiles, without a trace of kindness or happiness. “You asked ‘why Aradia?’. You were the easier target and we all knew it. But hey, never let it be said I’m not a team player.”

You look at Equius again, on the other side of a wall you can’t cross. “Ampora died,” he says, as if it’s an explanation. “And you-” his voice breaks for the first time. “You are worth more than a sad bargain and a helm. I-” He falters, then says, “I would have lost you either way.”

“Don’t help her,” you say again, your voice an empty whisper. He gets up, precise like clockwork, and walks away. “EQ!” you yell, thumping the wall again to try to get his attention as he walks away. “If I’m worth anything, I’m worth not letting this happen! EQ!”

He steps away from both you and Vriska, running a hand through his hair to stop it from sticking with sweat. Vriska watches him curiously, then leans forward as he exits the cell, snapping, “Hey!” She pushes herself up to bolt towards the exit, yelping, “Hey, hey, _hey_ -” only to slam into the field a bare second after Equius reactivates it. “Fuck you!” she snarls at Equius. “You’re in this as deep as I am and I _know_ you don’t know how to get out without me!”

Equius, who you should have remembered knows Vriska better than anyone, hesitates. “I’m sorry,” he says to her, and it may be the first time anyone has ever said that to her. He looks at you, then away, shame writ large. It’s the last tie he needs to sever before walking away, leaving you to sink back down to the floor in shock.

Vriska’s screech of rage is the sound of the last piece of your heart breaking.

\--

— System message received —  
> N1C3 7R1CK  
> 1F 1 G1V3 Y0U 4 CR3D W1LL Y0U D0 17 4G41N  
CT: D--> Who  
CT: D--> Ah  
CT: D--> The Helmsman of this ship, I w001d presume  
CT: D--> I am rather busy  
> Y34H N0 5H17  
> G07 4 L0NG H4RD 5H1F7 0F 837R4Y4L 70 P4CK 1N  
> FUCK, 4 L0NG H4RD 5H1F7 0F 5H4F71NG Y0UR FR13ND5 W0ULD H4V3 833N 83773R  
> 87W 1F Y0U 7H1NK Y0U’R3 G01NG 4NYWH3R3  
> Y0U’R3 N07  
CT: D--> You cannot enforce that  
> W3LL 1 M34N 1 D0N’7 G0774  
> Y0UR 3V4L5 54Y 7H47 Y0U’R3 PR0848LY 480U7 R34DY 70 P155 Y0UR53LF 4ND RUN 70 Y0UR L177L3 3MPR355 70 L1CK H3R 5H035 1N5734D 0F 35C4P1NG  
> 8U7 FUCK M3 H4V3 Y0U N3V3R 533N 4 H0RR0R M0V13  
> 1’M 4FR41D 1 C4N’7 L37 Y0U D0 7H47, FUCK80Y  
CT: D--> You will respond to command  
> N0 D1NN3R 0R DR1NK5 F1R57??  
> 7H3N 4G41N 1 D0N’7 7H1NK 1 W4N7 MY D35C3ND4N7’5 5L0PPY 53C0ND5  
CT: D--> Your  
CT: D--> Descendant  
> 0H Y34H  
> Y0U 5H0ULDN’7 H4V3 H3LM3D M3G1D0 1N5734D 0F L3771NG H1M 74K3 0N3 F0R 7H3 734M  
> W3 C0ULD H4V3 574R73D 4 F4M1LY 7R4D1710N  
CT: D--> I will take responsibility for my actions  
CT: D--> But I will not be held accountable to you  
> G05H, 7H47’5 50 N08L3 0F Y0U 70 D3C1D3  
> M4Y83 7H1NK 1N5734D: Y0U’R3 7R4PP3D 1N 4 5H1P W17H 4 P1553D-0FF H3LM5M4N WH053 C0ND1710N1NG F41L3D 83F0R3 7H3 M07H3R GRU8 5P47 0U7 7H3 7H0U54ND5 0F 7R0LL5 7H47 7H3N J3RK3D 0FF 1N70 4 8UCK37 4ND 7R1CKL3D D0WN 70 M4K3 Y0U  
> Y0U FUCK3D UP 4ND Y0U M4Y H4V3 RU1N3D 7H3 0N3 G00D 7H1NG 7H47 C4M3 0U7 0F 7H15 WH0L3 M355  
> 4ND Y0U’R3 73LL1NG 7H3 F1R57 R35UL7 0F F0RC3D H3LM1NG 7H47 Y0U’R3 N07 G01NG 70 83 H3LD 4CC0UN748L3 70 H1M  
> 5L0WCL4P5.G1F  
CT: D--> I  
CT: D--> My accountability is held by the Empress  
CT: D--> Then to Aradia and Sollux  
CT: D--> If  
CT: D--> If, after that, I live  
CT: D--> I will attempt to atone  
> 1 H0P3 Y0U KN0W WH47 Y0U JU57 PR0M153D

\--

The metal floor of your cell is cold. You know this because you’ve sprawled out over it, staring up at the ceiling and listening to the combined hums and whirs that are a ship at work. If you closed your eyes, it wouldn’t sound too different from the times you’ve fallen asleep on Aradia, more soothing to you than an actual heartbeat at this point.

You don’t close your eyes.

Vriska, now that she can walk again, paces like she’s getting ready to kick someone in the face. It’s better than just after Equius left, when she threw a tantrum, screeched more profanity at Equius than you’ve ever heard out of Karkat, and punched the wall hard enough that you think she broke something. 

“Does it help?” you ask, your voice - you knew that you scared Karkat with how blank and impassive you were, when Aradia first disappeared, but it’s nothing compared to the lack of any feeling at all that buries you now. Instead of you using apathy, this is apathy that uses you, and it would scare you if you had the capability to care. “Knowing you won?”

The sound of Vriska’s pacing halts. You let your head loll to look at her cell; she’s standing there, staring down at you in disbelief. “You call this a _win_?” she finally snarls, her hand balling into a fist.

You look away from her again. There may not be much time left before everything goes to shit, and you have to make the call about whether your moirail or the Empire comes first, but you can spend what you have needling Vriska. “You’re next in line on the culling list, but you took the Empire with you. GG.”

“Fuck _you_ ,” she hisses, the inventiveness she showed insulting Equius gone. “I just wanted out! You could have fucking let me go-” You tilt your head to look at her again. She snarls when she meets your eyes and whirls around just as her shoulders start to shake. “Fuck you,” she says again, her voice carefully controlled and slipping anyway. “This- It wasn’t meant to happen like this.”

“Guess that’s a no.” You look back at the ceiling, only to close your eyes and wince at the light. Just to complete the night, you’re getting a migraine.

“I wanted to see the look on Aradia’s face,” she says, after a long moment. “I- I wanted-” She sounds like the six-sweep-old she never was, lost and scared. “I wanted to play that card and see her realise she couldn’t top it.”

“Shut up,” you say, already resigned to the fact that it won’t work. She says something else, but you miss it thanks to the migraine stabbing behind your eyes. “What?”

There’s a moment of silence, and then Vriska says, “I didn’t say anything.”

A voice overlaps hers, a whisper just on the edges of your hearing. You sit up and frown, tilting your head like it’s actually a sound you can hear. Even when you focus on listening to the voice, it slips away. You’d swear it was saying something important, but you can’t distinguish a single word it’s saying.

“Captor, what the hell?” Vriska says, watching you.

You close your eyes. It’s a voice that isn’t a voice, and that means that you know exactly where it’s coming from. You’ve gotten so used to keeping your guards up that you do it without thinking; as you grit your teeth and dismantle them, the misery of an Empire flows over you.

You’ve always hated the voices. Most of them are just a murmur; there’s something about proximity and intensity, and the universe is a big place. Usually it’s just a few words, a snarl, so faint it might be in the furthest block of your neighbour’s hivestem; better than Aradia’s deal of having the dead constantly following her around, but not by much. You were a twitchy and paranoid kid until Aradia figured out what was going on and helped you build your walls.

There’s the background noise of millions dying that you tune out, leaving you the deaths on-planet. The voice you can hear still sounds _wrong_ , though, too far away for all that you can pick it out. You strain harder, trying to reach it-

A wall of sound hits you like a wave, knocking the wind out of you. You’re used to a scale of millions dying every minute, but this - this is beyond anything you’ve ever heard, and now that your walls are down you _can_ _’t get them back up_. The volume, a roar of voices with each and every one distinct from the rest if you could just focus, overwhelms every other sense you have, your body shutting down as it tries to process something that no troll should ever encounter. Then the roar turns into a single, unified scream, and you lose whatever tenuous grip on your reality you had, clinging to the knowledge that you are _you_ by the skin of your teeth.

Just when you’re about to lose that - have it torn from you or let it go; you don’t know which - the feeling of something stroking your cheek hits you, completely disconnected from any familiar feeling of having a body. It jolts you enough that you try, vainly, to pull yourself together, find your walls and get out of here and warn someone - _anyone_ \- that the sky has come crashing down. The scream cuts out not a second after the strange feeling, and then your walls slam back into place with an unwarranted vengeance to the near-silence they now guard against.

You’re staring up at the light again. It takes a moment to process that you can see, that the light isn’t a scream no matter how much it feels like one. When you lift your hand and look at it, it’s the strangest thing you’ve ever done. After a moment of looking at it, you reach up and pat your face; your fingers come away warm and sticky from a drying nosebleed. The tang of metal is sharp in the back of your throat, too.

“How long was I out?” you say, more to break the silence than because you want Vriska to tell you. The sound makes you flinch, before you realise it’s just a voice, just yours.

Vriska’s crouching by the wall, staring at you speechlessly. “You weren’t out,” she says, finally. “You were screaming.”

You should sit up. You should get up, do _something,_ considering that you just heard more people die than have ever been alive. But you’ve just had your world come crashing down regardless, and you are cold and sore, and if something has just gone horribly wrong it can _stay_ horribly wrong, like everything else.

\--

More hours pass. You knew it would take a while for Feferi to stabilise, and the beginning of a lifetime for Karkat and everyone he’s collected to restore order and figure out what’s happening next, but you thought that someone might want to get you away from Vriska sooner than this. You’re too awake, too aware to sleep it off, the memory of that one scream still reverberating in your bones. Vriska is huddled in the furthest corner of her cell, silent and unmoving, and you have no desire to dig any further into how carefully she’s screwed each and every one of you over.

At least she’s included in the consequences, this time.

When the door opens, you sit up, because despite everything you still - don’t want to throw yourself away, don’t want to throw the _Empire_ away, and someone should be told about your weird mental lapse. Feferi might know. You expect Kanaya or Terezi, come to escort you elsewhere, but-

Feferi, still pale and scars fresh and livid, walking with only a little assistance from the trident she took from Condesce, searches for a moment before slapping a palm against the switch that opens your cell. Karkat follows her, and dread builds up in your throat, because you could see Feferi _or_ Karkat being here for a good reason, but not both of them together. Not now, when the aftermath is still settling all around you.

Karkat’s in your cell almost before the wall is down, and you scramble to your feet when he touches your shoulder. He looks up at you for minute like his heart is breaking, your fear ratcheting higher every second he doesn’t say anything. After a moment, his hand shaking - fucking _shaking_ \- he reaches up and touches your face.

“KK, what the _fuck_?” you say, more freaked out by his silence than by anything else that’s happened since you got locked in here.

He drops his hand, only to grab at your shirt and drag you closer to him, clumsy, burying his head into your chest like a grub. When you awkwardly wrap your injured arm around his shoulders, he shifts to cling to you, nearly crushing the air out of your lungs. You rub his shoulder, as much as you can, and use your actual hand to point at him while mouthing, ‘what the _fuck,_ ’ over his head to Feferi.

When she looks at you, she doesn’t look much better off than Karkat does. The heartbreak and horror in their eyes when they look at you - like they’re _mourning you_ \- seems to silence her as well, but then she shakes her head. “There’s something you need to see,” she tells you, subdued - and that scares you into a jerky nod, because the whole of the Empire aimed at her heart hasn’t been able to subdue Feferi.

Vriska doesn’t say anything as you leave. She doesn’t even look up. You think about saying something to her, but what would be the point?

—

You look up at the figure in the Helm and think, numbly, that this is _exactly_ what being kicked in the shame globes feels like. 

“He messaged me,” Feferi says, her hand locked tightly around her culling fork and grim expression locked just as tightly in place. “I thought - it was only a matter of time before someone came looking, so I asked Karkat to secure the Helmsblock, and…”

No wonder Karkat had the reaction he did. This is - beyond macabre. You’ve seen photos of Helming installations, the surgical process; even maintaining Aradia has desensitised you to all the various ways the body can be cut apart and invaded. This is another level altogether. Even the oldest ship you found for Vriska was - less. The biowires carpet the entire block, minus a narrow catwalk; when you approach the column, Feferi and Karkat hanging back, it’s all too easy to imagine them rising up and swallowing you. You don’t know _what_ your psi is doing, here in the heart of the ship, the sheer pressure of all the energy it takes to power the Battleship swirling in eddies around your skin. Between it and the depths of biowire below you, it reminds you of Gl’bgolyb.

Fuck. You used to think Ancestors were fake when you were young, like every other edgy douchebag who could calculate statistical probabilities. Then Eridan and Vriska found their Ancestors’ treasure troves, and you moved on to the opinion that Ancestors were a thing, but only highbloods would ever get a _legacy_. The universe really likes laughing at you, because here your legacy is.

It’s probably terrible of you to be offended by the craftsmanship. The goggles are standard, of course, obscuring the harsh lines of his cheekbones with the hair-fine biowire tendrils carefully connected to them. The grafting on his shoulders and neck is sloppy, biowire left to grow into him with barely any direction, resulting in some pretty ugly criss-crossed scars of old and new growth patterns. His arms and legs- 

You kick up without thinking to get on eye level, your psi sliding seamlessly into the room’s currents. After a moment, once you’re used to the new balance of power, you lean in and really _look_. He has your face - _your face_ , the arch of your lips and the blade of your nose. It’s not that you could be close hatchmates - apart from the scarring and the fact that one of you is currently hanging in a Helm, you could be the same person.

When you lean in even further the opaque face of his goggles jerks around to face you like you’ve tripped some sort of proximity sensor. Your breath catches in your chest as your brain kicks into flight or fight mode and gets stuck in-between, and he snarls - through teeth, _your_ teeth - “ _Boo_.”

You shriek like a new-hatched grub and drop like a stone to the catwalk, scrambling back by kicking your legs more than any sophisticated method of movement, and are halfway back to Feferi and Karkat before you process what just happened and the wheezing gasps of laughter coming from the Helm.

Feferi slowly relaxes, bringing her trident back up out of a guard; Karkat does the same, disappearing his sickles. “I forgot to mention,” Feferi says, sour, “that you inherited his attitude.”

You pick yourself back up and dust yourself off, wincing when you hit your side. That didn’t do your ribs any favours, or the stump of your arm, which aches in a way that makes you think you popped some healing skin back open. Once up, you push past Karkat to get to the door, completely over the situation.

“Aw, you ungrateful fuck,” your own voice mocks. “I came all this way just to say hi and I don’t even get a hug?” When you don’t move, he adds, “Looked in on you with the Serket. Thought you could use a _hand_.”

Your own ident doesn’t open the door. “FF,” you say, even and flat. She looks once at your Ancestor before turning to walk to you.

“Talked to your moirail,” he says, just as she’s about to touch her card to the reader. Both of you freeze and look back at the Helm, where the Helmsman wears a wide grin that looks - odd, on someone who looks so much like you. “You kids have really fucked yourself over there.”

You turn and start walking back towards him.

“Sollux,” Karkat says, warning.

“Looked into you when you started stirring up shit,” your Ancestor tells you, speaking just to you. Feferi and Karkat may as well not exist. “You _love_ that girl. You kept her alive when she should’ve been ash and bone. And you’ve kept her safe.” The psi on your skin prickles, as taunting as his words. “Then your conversation with the Serket.” You step to the end of the catwalk, craning your neck back to look at him. “There’s only one path now if you want to keep this going, and you love her enough to let her hate you for it.” He drops his voice low, intimate. “ _Lie to her_. Make her believe her own lies. Get in her head and paper over the horror and give this new helmsrig the foundation it _needs_.”

Your rage at hearing your own thoughts spoken out loud makes your control slip. Your psi flares, pressing back against the constant psionic presence he leaks, burning you your own space for the time it takes you to remember what a bad idea that was.

“Cute,” your Ancestor says, and the weight of the world doubles down on your shoulders. “But you’ve gotta be a bit taller to get on this ride.”

You cut back your raw emanation, which is and always has been a showoff move, a stupid instinctual intimidation tactic like Eridan flaring his fins. That done, you bring together all the psi you can muster, float yourself up to his level, draw back your good hand, and punch him in the face.

He laughs, blood running down his chin. “You’ll still do it. You’re a scared little shit trying to bubblewrap the world for her. You _fucked up_ the _Empire_ for this girl. You think you’re not gonna fuck her up too, if it’ll save her?” His voice loses all humour, going cruel. “I would have.”

Bereft of all other options, you drop back to the catwalk. “What else am I supposed to do?” Your voice comes out as a whisper, the first words you say to your Ancestor quite possibly the most pathetic you’ve ever been in your entire life. Any doubts you had are gone, replaced by the way he knew to cut straight to your heart. He’s all the self-loathing that keeps you up at night, curled into the depths of your cupe, and only aeons spent with these thought cycles would have let him perfect that cruelty. 

He’s silent for a long while, the barely-detectable rise and fall of his chest the only thing that makes him even seem alive. “You’ve done enough,” he finally says, but it lacks the mean edge you’ve come to expect. He sounds exhausted, instead; you talking to Terezi after sunrise so you can cut yourselves on each other’s sharp edges. “You deciding what to do got you here and you think you should still call the shots? Seems _legit_.”

You stand for a moment, quiet, Feferi and Karkat watching you from the door. Then you give your Ancestor a nod - barely - and turn to leave again.

“Sollux!” _Thollukth_ , ugh, your lisp sounds even worse when it’s not coming out of your mouth. When you pause and turn back, he grins at you, no artifice. “You’re a scumbag, but you did good with the helmsrig.”

You look at him, then down at your hand. Somehow, magically, it transforms into a finger flipping him off over your shoulder as you walk away. Feferi opens the door, and it closes on your Ancestor’s laughter.

\--

Feferi lasts the trip back to the upper levels of the Battleship with her chin up and shoulders back, only to collapse into a chair and lean heavily on her trident as soon as you get into a meeting room and the door shuts between her and the rest of the Empire. When Karkat hovers over her, she waves him off with a tired hand. “We need to decide what to do about Aradia and Vriska,” she tells you. Not unkindly, but the words are inherently unkind. 

You close your eyes for just a moment, wanting this night to be over. This has been enough of a clusterfuck that you were detached from the immediacy of the situation, but the thought of seeing Aradia properly for the first time after all this shit hit the fan brings it all right back, including the fear - she hates you, she blames you, she _knows_. You push it down because - maybe she does. It wouldn’t be unjustified. But you can’t just let this go, now.

“I need to talk to AA,” you tell Feferi and Karkat. “Alone.”

Feferi’s shoulders sag, and Karkat buries his face in his hands. “That,” he informs you, muffled and despairing, “sounds like the most disastrous idea that has ever graced this tiny pathway of paradox space, and that includes our decision to try our hand at ruling the Empire.”

When you don’t speak, the silence spins out. You let it, waiting, until Feferi finally sighs and hauls herself back upright. “I’ll get someone to find Aradia and tell her you’re here,” she says, and puts her hand on your shoulder half to steady herself and half to soothe you. “If she comes or not…”

You nod. Feferi straightens herself back into her public, infallible persona and sweeps out the door; Karkat follows after surprising you with another brief, awkwardly-positioned hug. You breathe in the comforting, familiar smell of him and are entirely too reassured by the fact that, despite everything, you and Karkat have managed to remain friends.

Aradia’s presence precedes her, when she finally comes, the clash of her psi with the ambiance of your Ancestor’s sending her rage through every hall and pricking at your horns. Instead of making you afraid, it’s yet another thing that calms you; Aradia’s psi has been a constant in your life, and Aradia being angry isn’t anything you’re not used to, either.

She can’t slam open the door, but you have to admire her restraint in not singeing a hole straight through it. In the intervening time between Feferi leaving and her arrival, you’ve come up with a solid plan for how to deal with this conversation. The plan immediately goes to shit when you see what she’s carrying.

“Is-” you manage to get out, before she hurls Eridan’s scarf at you, practically vibrating with how furious she is. You decide to give up on that angle of communication and instead turn the scarf over in your hands. It - it shouldn’t be here, it was _gone_ and she had no reason to take and hide it, but when you press it to your nose it smells like him, salt water and Ahab’s ozone and the ground-in smell of someone a piece of clothing picks up when it’s worn for lifetimes.

“There is something going very, very wrong,” Aradia seethes. You think of the scream you were assaulted with and jerk your head up to meet her eyes. “And _I_ am being expected to _clean it up_.”

You look at Aradia, who has the fate of one world on her shoulders about to break her and certainly doesn’t need another, and then loop the scarf over your shoulders for lack of anything else to do. You’re past the point where you need to question her, grill her about every single danger she may or may not run headlong into. “Don’t.”

Her anger ticks up another notch. “I am _not_ going to be _ordered_ on how to handle my life-”

You stand up, meet her eye-to-eye. Even now, you feel the sick guilt that is everything you have done to her, all the choices that have led to this pathway, this moment with you and your moirail with more important things than an Empire to shatter between you. “Whatever’s happening, _fuck it_ , AA. I love you. Please don’t wade into someone else’s mess.”

She draws back a little, her eyes widening. Then they narrow again. “What do you want?”

It’s your turn to be startled. “I-” Your words die in your mouth, too trite, too much. Finally you sit down again and press your hand to your head, too tired to strain for better words. “I fucked up, as your moirail,” you say, resigned to the truth. “Ever since I nearly killed you.” Fuck, you thought you were done with the crying, but it seems not. If there’s a time and a place, it’s now, though. You owe AA that much, whatever happens. “I’ve been trying to make up for it.” You look away, clenching your teeth, before you admit: “I wanted to keep you safe, and if I could have died to keep you safe, I would have.” You wave the arm that’s missing a hand, evidence of your stupid, self-inflicted deathwish. “And you never wanted that.”

“If you think _your_ guilt somehow makes up for everything _Vriska_ did to me, you’re still missing the point.” Aradia’s anger is still there, contemptuous, but after a long moment she draws out the chair next to you and sits in it with a _whud_. “If you _really_ want to get into wronging me, throwing yourself on the flogging jut to take away my choice of whether I _wanted_ to be safe is the place to start.”

You nod, then steel yourself and force yourself to look at her. “I’m starting to get it. And-” your voice breaks, as you look at your moirail and all your shared history, “-I get it if that means we’re quits after this.”

“After this?” she snaps, her voice a lash.

“I’m not supposed to tell you this.” You clench and unclench your hand reflexively, the way you do when you sit back in your chair to think through some code and are trying to stave off a cramp. “But I’m fucking done being someone complicit in taking a choice away from you.” You pause a moment, then take a deep breath to get this out as fast as you can. “FF’s rule can’t handle the truth behind the rig and you coming out now. Vriska did this especially so that if you were caught, you’d be trapped in the position of having to advocate for the helm without putting a toe out of line for the rest of your life.” Finally, you let a bitter smile cross your face. “Or destroy the Empire we just won.”

Aradia’s silent for a long time, her hands in fists so tight they tremble. She looks at her hands and then spits, “She took _your rig_ and- and _enslaved me-_ ”

You close your eyes. “And she manipulated Equius into doing it, because he wanted to make sure I didn’t throw myself into the Helm to save you.”

She gets up and paces away two short, angry strides before letting out a screech, pacing back, and kicking the chair she was sitting on across the room. You barely flinch, even when she slams her fists into the table, collapsing into another chair and bowing her head to either wail or scream again into her arms.

“That’s why,” you say, your voice not enough to fill the emptiness of the room. “Whatever this - bullshit happening is, fuck it. I don’t know what it is. I don’t care how big it is.” You look down at the table, unable to watch as Aradia comes to terms with the unpalatable future being laid out for her. “This is big enough.” You swallow and prepare to say the most dangerous thing you’ve ever said to the volatile, beautiful girl you fell in love with and nearly destroyed. “If you chose - not to Helm. To tell the truth and tell the Empire to get fucked.” Your voice fades to a whisper. “I’d be there with you.”

Aradia looks up at you, her sclera reddened with rage and misery. “That-” she says, before her voice cuts off in a choke. “I wanted you there and-” She looks away, her mouth quivering, fisting her hands in her hair and curling into herself. “I had to let her _in_ to crash the ship and I woke up and you were- dead, Vriska again-” Her voice breaks again, before she manages to say in a rush, begging, “Sollux, _I can_ _’t do this on my own_.”

You take a chance and stand up, holding out your hand, trying not to show that you want this so badly you ache. You thought you were well acquainted with having your heart broken by now, between Eridan and Equius, but you don’t think you could ever come back from this, without your moirail. Aradia launches herself into you so quickly you barely have time to doubt, even being you, and though you can feel her new ports digging into your skin, she’s warm against you and fits as perfectly as she always did. She sobs into your chest, heaving and ugly sobs, and you murmur soothing things into her ear with your arms around her like a vise as you both sway back and forth, finding a new equilibrium with each other.

\--

You think Karkat nearly dies of relief when he opens the door of the meeting room and leans in, finding a distinct lack of bodies. Aradia curled up on you, as much as she could with these seats, her forehead pressed into your collarbones and hands tangled in your shirt, which can no longer be called clean after all the crying it’s absorbed. You can’t throw any stones, given that you’ve been doing the same to her hair.

“Feferi-” Karkat says, then stops. “Is that-?”

You follow his gaze and - ah. Eridan’s scarf, still looped over your shoulders. Aradia unfolds herself and gets up, letting you do the same as you tug the scarf off and hand it to Karkat. He handles it more delicately than you’ve ever seen Karkat handle something in his life, rubbing the worn-soft knit between his fingers, his expression slipping from the weary facade he’s had stapled on. Suddenly he’s only your best friend, terrified and broken-hearted. “Where the _everloving fuck_ -” He connects some dots admirably for exactly the wrong result. “ _Vriska_? Vriska took it?”

You look at Aradia, letting her lead. She combs her hair back out of her face, then says, quiet, “A ghost gave it to me.”

Karkat barely hears her, still fascinated by the scarf. You reach out and close his hands around it, which makes him start in surprise. He looks at you, then at the scarf with naked longing, before shoving it back against your chest. “Don’t be a bulgewipe,” he says, gruff. “Do you _know_ the earful I’ll get from Kanaya if I try to wear a scarf with this fucking uniform?” The stupid public persona comes back, but - softened, a little. There’s something behind it now, not just an emptiness trying to fill itself up with purpose. “I don’t even _get_ cold, you moron. What am I meant to do with a scarf, wear it as a belt?”

You loop the scarf back around your neck, settling it properly. “You could wear a cape.” Aradia’s ‘ghost’ comment seems to have been dismissed, probably categorised firmly in the realm of Spooky Shit My Friends Can Do That I Don’t Want To Think Too Hard About. “You’d get to billow dramatically into all your meetings.”

“If only this were a pesterlog, so I could send an eternally-recurring stream of the words ‘fuck’ and ‘you’ while not having to actually care about your opinions enough to expend calories in the effort,” Karkat says, then holds up a hand in your face when you try to snark back. “Sorry, I’ve been summoned to a meeting with the last fuck I possess, and it seems to be running late! I’m going to be stuck here until it shows up.” He drops his hand after a second and sighs. “Feferi’s down with Vriska. We need to get this decided now.”

Aradia draws back, the anger she still carries coming back to the forefront. “Good,” she says, and it’s _all_ she says. Karkat flinches at the threat; you reach out and link your hand with hers. You always knew you’d die for your moirail, you knew you’d make any promise and make good on it - and here is where you are.

She has you, and you have her. To the end - to _whatever necessary_ end. 

—

Terezi is in the cells with Feferi, both of them with completely unreadable expressions as they watch Vriska, who is still curled in the corner she was in when you left. Feferi seems a little stronger, at least, her colour a little less deathly. Terezi, in contrast, looks like a hot mess, wrinkled clothes and tension in the corners of her lips. You’re about to reach out to her, but before you can, she takes off her glasses, drops them, and stomps on them. You shouldn’t be able to tell, with her sclera one solid colour - _she_ shouldn’t be able to do it, since she sees through other senses - but she looks directly at Aradia afterwards, chin high as she waits for judgement.

“Some of us,” Aradia says, “can’t throw away our reminders.”

“Some of us,” Terezi returns, voice crisp as the rest of her isn’t, “are done hiding them.” Her mouth trembles, before she firms it into a harsh line. “I-” Tangled up in her tone is all the recrimination you’ve thrown at yourself, the desperation of racing a clock, hitting rock bottom and failing the people you love. She steels herself again. “Is this over?”

Aradia walks the few steps over to Terezi, the ports on her face that can’t be hidden catching the light and throwing it over her features oddly, making her seem even less of a troll than usual. She takes Terezi’s face in both hands and leans in until only a breath separates them, and into that space she says, “Flip a coin.”

The smile that takes over Terezi’s face is too painful in how honest it is, the laughs of her breath stirring an equally painful quirk of Aradia’s lips. “The prosecution sees no coin, Your Honour.”

Terezi has always known what it’s taken you too long to grasp. You wanted to encompass Aradia’s fate in the flip of a coin, the _fairness_ of you shouldering the burden from her; Terezi understands, innately, that the dichotomy is and always has been complete bullshit. 

“I’m sorry,” Terezi whispers to Aradia, and it’s enough.

Feferi stands up, more limber than the last time you saw her, breaking the mood of the room. “Vriska,” she says, and in the cell Vriska flinches, even though she doesn’t look up. Now that you’re calm, in and of yourself, you can see the banked fury in Feferi’s eyes. “She has _wronged_ the entire Empire. Everything she knows and everything she has done undermine everything I’ve built this position on, and she can’t go free with this knowledge.” She meets Aradia’s eyes, undeterred by the visage of the new Helmsman. “Is that going to cause a problem?”

“Am I a secret to be covered up?” Aradia asks, soft, the coaxing of her voice a trap. 

Feferi hesitates. Finally, she says, “I don’t know.” She looks small, next to Aradia, and still half-dead, and for all that, she refuses to bend under the weight of Aradia’s situation. “I can’t let Vriska live. That’s a foregone conclusion.” Her hand tightens around the culling fork. “I promised once that you would never be a Helmsman, and that nobody unwilling would ever be made to do the job under my rule.” You start, as you remember that long-ago conversation with Feferi, before everything - before you got your hands bloody, creating this Empire. “I can’t break my promises and be the Empress I want to be, Aradia.”

Aradia wraps her hand around the haft of the culling fork, over Feferi’s smaller hand, and tilts the culling fork until it rests at her throat. “There’s an easy solution,” she says, cruel and unforgiving as the tines of the fork etch scratches in her throat, drops of red beading along them. “Easier than lying to me. _Kinder_ than making me lie.”

“I’m not asking you to lie,” Feferi says, shoulder back, so ready to strike that you want to shove yourself between them. _You can_ _’t take it from her_ , you tell yourself, and let the nails of your hand dig into your palm as you watch. “I’m asking you to choose. I’m asking you if you _can_ choose.” Her expression is stern, the planes of her face looking like Condesce’s despite the fact that Feferi hasn’t moulted. 

“If I can’t?” Aradia asks. “What kind of choice is a mercy cull or enslavement, _Empress_?”

“The only one I have to offer,” Feferi says. “It’s not good enough. But I swear-” her voice drops, intense, “-I _swear_ , no more broken promises, that I will _make it better_.”

Aradia surveys Feferi, her anger burning cold. You’ve seen your moirail lash out. You’ve seen her rage, you know the swathe of destruction she can carve as intimately as you know your own. This is new, the culmination of Aradia’s entire life and her refusal to compromise. For the space of a held breath, you _know_ , deep in your bones, that one of them is going to die here. Then Aradia rocks back on her heels, letting go of the trident. Feferi doesn’t stumble, just pulls out of the ready position she was in, and then-

Laughter. Bitter, low and judging. Vriska uncurls herself from her seat and saunters closer to the wall nearest you, dusting herself off. “You think you can take it,” she tells Aradia, through the wall. Terezi twists, reaches back, and the wall turns off. Neither Vriska nor Aradia move, and then Vriska gives Aradia a sharp once-over before the corner of her mouth hooks up, steps outside her cell to circle the Helmsman she’s made of your moirail. “The weight of all those opinions. People judging. Helm junkie, cullbait, _political tool_.” She makes it all the way around Aradia, who watches her like she’s the scorpion she was born under. “Who’d do that to herself?” Vriska asks, affecting a concerned tone. “How is she not _broken_?”

Aradia reaches up, caresses Vriska’s cheek with her metal hand, a too-personal moment made a mockery with the impersonal, cool touch of not-flesh. Vriska keeps it there with her own prosthetic hand, the only one she has left, as Aradia leans in, an echo of her conversation with Terezi. The Scourge Sisters have always been echoes of each other, with Aradia caught in the middle. “If you wanted to break me,” Aradia tells her, hate she can’t conceal in every syllable, “you shouldn’t have burned out my heart.” When she kisses Vriska, her eyes close; when Aradia pulls away, she doesn’t open them again for a long moment.

Nobody has ever seen Vriska Serket so torn-up and empty. She jerks her gaze down to the floor, her hair spilling forward and hiding her face, when she remembers the rest of you are there, but not before you saw the tremble of her mouth and the tears welling up in the eye you left her.

Feferi sighs, a regret you can only hear because of how you’re sandwiched between her and Terezi, and levels her trident. “Are you going to fight this?” she asks Vriska, Feferi gone and the Empress left in her place. 

No psi in the brig leaves Vriska no avenue of escape through taking over someone else’s mind. Equius was her last resort, and he fell through; her luck has finally run out, the irons in the fire out of her reach. You know this corner, because Vriska painted you into it through her plans, whittling away at the revolution until she stole Aradia and left you the lie that there was still a way out, if you were willing to ruin everything you’d worked for.

You had been. Your arm aches; you’ll always have the scars of what she tricked you into sacrificing, how willing you went. Aradia folds her arms, her jaw gone tight. She knows the feeling better than you ever will. Vriska sinks to her knees, slow, disbelieving, her hair still curling over her shoulders and hiding everything except the hard, neutral line of her mouth.

Feferi draws back her culling fork, and just as she’s about to lunge, Vriska says, “No,” startling Feferi into obeying the order. Vriska doesn’t notice, flicks her hair back to look directly at Terezi instead, her expression hard despite the evidence of tears. “You owe me.” Terezi’s hands go slack. “You _promised_ ,” Vriska snarls. “If I was ever too _dangerous-_ ”

The rasp of Terezi’s sword against its sheath is the most painful sound that you have ever heard. “You always were,” Terezi says, her composure nigh-unnatural. “I was just too weak.”

“I am what I was made to be.” Vriska tilts her head back, baring her throat and taunting the person who loved her most. “What’s your excuse, Neophyte? You think this is _just_?”

“No,” Terezi says, and takes one perfect step forward. Vriska chokes on a gasp of pain and reaches up to the blade transfixing her, Terezi’s stab precise through her heart. Before any of you can process what just happened, Terezi steps back, a mechanical follow-through of the strike she just executed, yanking her sword out of the wound. She drops the blade to kneel in front of Vriska, heedless of the blood Vriska drowns her in. “You could always sweet-talk justice,” she says, and links her fingers through Vriska’s, stopping her from covering the wound. “This was what was owed.”

Vriska collapses to the floor, a small figure wreathed in widening cerulean. Terezi presses two fingers to her neck, and only when she takes them away to press her hands to her face and sob - near-silent, shoulders barely shaking - does the room breathe again. Aradia nudges her hand into your side until you take it, while Karkat goes to kneel by Terezi, equally ignoring Vriska’s blood as it soaks into his pants.

“I’m going to miss her,” Terezi finally squeezes out, her voice high and panicked. Aradia makes a pained noise. “I hate everything she’s done and _I_ _’m going to miss her_.”

Karkat draws Terezi over to him until she leans against his chest, lets him put a hand in her hair and trembles at the soothing. “You,” he grinds out through gritted teeth, rubbing her back in careful, slow movements, “were _never_ too weak for Vriska fucking Serket. She failed _you_.”

Terezi, with the guilt of the barely-moulted grub she was when she and Vriska tied the first knot in the tangled mess of their relationship ground in over sweeps and rivers of blood, allows herself one racking sob into Karkat’s shoulder. Then she pushes aside his hand, and even with the scars Vriska has left weighing her down, she stands.

“This,” she says, her composure replaced with a quiet ferocity as she picks up her sword and wipes Vriska’s blood off on her sleeve, “will never happen again. The circumstances that create Vriska Serket will _never happen again_.” Her sheathing of the sword contains all the viciousness her execution lacked. “This Empire owes itself that much.”

\--

You’ve had to spend too much time in rooms with dead bodies and no idea of how to dispose of them lately. Feferi rescues all of you from having to think about it, summoning the tealblooded admin who seems to be everywhere at once and turning the task over to her. She only nods at the order, barely sparing a glance for the carnage that is all that is left of Vriska, and after consulting her palmtop, says, “Equius Zahhak has requested a moment of your time.”

You and Aradia both stiffen. Karkat, still bloody and increasingly tired, notices despite everything, his eyes darting between the two of you. “No,” he says, before anyone else can get a word in. “No, I refuse to believe that the greasy shitstain on the week that this night has been can get _any fucking worse._ I refuse to allow it on general principles. Sweet, drone-fucking gods of common sense, tell me that meaningful look was not what I think it was.”

Feferi watches Karkat, a confused frown deepening as the rant pours out of his mouth. In the silence where neither you nor Aradia answer him, her eyes widen. She looks betrayed - _personally_ betrayed, although you can’t figure out why. She storms out the door, with only a snapped, “Tell him to meet me in the Helmsblock,” left in her wake.

You and Aradia fall in behind her without needing to check on the plan. The two of you have the most stake in whatever happens next, by any measure, and Karkat and Terezi aren’t in a state to run through the ship while you’re all trying to be discreet about Vriska’s death. For all that she’s still smaller than both of you, unmoulted, you and Aradia nearly have to jog to keep up with her angry stride. It’s a good thing that the route to the anonymous door hiding the Helmsblock is clear, because you don’t think Feferi would hesitate to go through anything in her path.

Aradia gasps at her first view of your Ancestor in the Helm. He doesn’t react to your presence, this time, head resting against one of the tangles of biowire that sprouts from his shoulders, lost deep in processing. He knows you’re there - more than anyone, he knows the precise impact of each and every presence in the ship - but if he doesn’t see fit to greet you, then he doesn’t see fit to greet you.

“Sollux,” Aradia says, her voice a horrified whisper. “Did you _know_?” You shake your head, and speechless, she walks up the catwalk towards him just as you did earlier. “No wonder you were such an asshole,” she tells the Helm, then jerks back when his head snaps up, intent.

The door opens without being keyed, and a gleeful, satisfied smirk you know too well graces the Helmsman’s face. When Equius steps inside, the door closing behind him, he’s first drawn up short by you and Aradia, the sound of the guillotine falling. Feferi moves, and he turns to look at her-

-and sees your Ancestor, who could have been you in another life, strung up in the Helm. He doesn’t seem surprised, but the image hits him hard anyway, dragging him to his knees, a strange and defeated laugh the only noise he makes.

“Tell me why I shouldn’t cull you,” Feferi says, her voice more rageful than you expected. “Tell me that you had a _reason_ for betraying me like this.”

“I thought I had a reason,” Equius says, finally looking away from the Helm. “I was mistaken.”

Feferi stalks forward, Condesce’s heavy trident spinning in her hand as she moves into a better striking position. “I trusted you,” she snarls, and when her face catches the dim light you realise her face is wet with tears. “I trusted you and you did - _this_ , Equius.”

Of course. Theirs would have been the most _proper_ kismessitude to exist. Now Equius - _you trusted him and he did this_ \- has crossed Feferi, and in crossing Feferi has crossed the Empire, signing his death away in the process. The same logic as Vriska stands: a threat to the Empress’ reign, at this point, is a threat to the stability of the Empire.

There is still a tiny, sad shard of your heart that remembers how carefully Equius kissed you, and you are so tired of hurting.

“I know,” Equius says, and tilts his head back, inviting the cull. Feferi flinches at the similarity to Vriska, her culling fork slipping out of her fingers. Between Condesce and Vriska, and herself, she seems to have reached her limit for debts paid in blood for the night.

“This is all very touching and _noble_ ,” the Helmsman says, practically spitting the last word, “but if you’re going to pussy out, I have a suggestion.”

Equius goes pale at the sound of your voice coming from the Helmsman.

“I want to never cross his path again,” Feferi says, her voice shaking with anger. Here, where she’s not under the eye of anyone who will see her mask slip, she’s catching up on all the rage at the way her Empire has nearly collapsed beneath her, and Equius is the only target she has left. “I want him to suffer. I want him to _atone_.”

The Helmsman’s grin turns even crueller, if possible. “Give him the same choice that he gave Megido.” He leans forward in the helm - which you thought was impossible - just to intimidate Equius. To his credit, Equius doesn’t shy away. “He’s the hero that made the detachable rig. Let him be. Let him get all the accolades and let him fucking _sweat_.” Equius swallows, and the Helmsman laughs. “Yeah, thought you’d like that, you weaksauce pail-piss.” He turns his head back to Feferi, a machine approximating organic interaction. “Put him in R &D. Make him tear the rig apart. Make him explain, again and _again_ , what exactly it does. The fucking nerds there aren’t going to give a shit if he lets something seditious slip.”

Feferi looks up at your Ancestor, then nods. “That sounds fitting.” Her voice is cold, the edge on it personal. “But it’s your choice, Equius. Sollux is the one associated with the detachable rig. We can work something out.”

“What does it matter?” Equius asks, every line of his body full of self-loathing.

Before he can say anything else, Aradia stomps up and slaps him, her prosthetic hand leaving deep, bloody cuts. “Don’t you _dare_ ,” she snaps, vengeance incarnate. “Don’t you _dare_ pretend this doesn’t matter.”

Equius looks up at her, eyes wide and glasses askew. “I-”

“The choice _matters_!” she snarls. “ _Making_ the choice matters.”

“You done fucked up,” the Helmsman says. “You think you get a _pretty_ choice when you fuck up this bad?” You’ve long since decided your Ancestor is a tool, but when he speaks next, every single tell that made you think ‘generic internet fuckface’ is gone, and all that’s left is menace. “You don’t deserve the easy out. You don’t deserve an out until you know one _tenth_ of the trap you put Megido in. You don’t deserve to make the choice until you know what the options _mean_.”

Equius looks at you. You look back, your face schooled to neutral, and wait for him to make his decision.

“I will endeavour to learn,” he says, and you let out a breath you didn’t know you were holding.

\--

You push your way past three trolls in Maintenance uniforms on your way to the bridge, the messages over the PA system exactly as indecipherable and urgent as every other message you have ever heard over a PA system. It’s kind of nice, you reflect, as you find a set of emergency stairs and throw yourself up them two at a time, that all these incompetent nookweeds whose only job seems to be getting in your way have started to actually get in your way, instead of giving the Helmsman kid a wide berth.

Feferi and Karkat are already there when you make it to the bridge, dodging sideways through another rush before you make it to them. Now that she’s moulted, you’d expected Feferi to lean on her physical similarity to Condesce to keep the crew of the Battleship - _Flagship_ \- in line. They seem to mostly be doing that themselves, though, leaving her to smile at you when you fetch up beside her chair - no throne, here, just a simple chair out of the way of operations - and wheeze.

“I swear to fuck, FF, if you and the Helmsman are fucking with me again-”

She smiles, it barely reaching her eyes. It hasn’t been long enough for any of you to start smiling for real, a scant handful of weeks spent frantically sorting out the drones and the unorthodox Ascension, but at least she’s trying. “It is pretty funny, but not this time.”

Karkat, who has disdained his chair and is sitting cross-legged on his desk, frantically tapping out messages on his palmtop, doesn’t look up as he addresses you. “You may have heard of this incredible new invention known as a _clock_ , Sollux.”

“It’s time,” Aradia says from behind you. You jump, and she pats at you absently. “All the Ascension shuttles are loaded,” she tells Karkat. “Everyone’s waiting on us.”

“Of course they are,” Karkat mutters, and types faster. “Bulge-chafing, pustule-ridden-” 

Only you four are left on the Flagship. Kanaya and Terezi each opted for a commission, Terezi to the legislacerators despite everything, and Kanaya - you think - as far away as she can get. Her feelings concerning Vriska were complicated, but they still existed. Karkat stayed with Feferi, for obvious reasons, and Aradia… 

Feferi kept the Battleship Condescension as her own, and your Ancestor may as well _be_ the Battleship Condescension. Every attempt at broaching the subject of getting him out of the Helm results in a tirade of insults, often rhyming, and you’ve all mostly given up. It leaves Aradia in an odd position, Feferi’s right-hand Helmsman without a ship, and there are already some nasty rumours circulating that the rig installed in her is a fake. You’ll have to do something about that, eventually, but for now, the situation buys her some freedom.

She needs it. You all do. Karkat asked you two nights ago when you’d give up and get a fucking robot hand already, and you’re both still licking the wounds from that fight.

You collapse into the chair beside Feferi before Aradia can steal it, which is probably a huge social faux pas, but it turns out that you continue to not give a fuck. Aradia leans on the back of it instead, her hair draping over your horns and generally being a pain. “How long?” you ask Karkat, on the basis that he seems to know.

He types one last message, then holds up his palmtop and mic-drops it like the asshole he is. “We just need the Imperial mandate.”

Feferi stands up, and the bridge goes silent. You follow her lead, as does Karkat. Aradia, already standing, straightens. She looks at the three of you, waiting for - encouragement? Absolution? Your hand rises to the scarf you’ve taken to wearing, and her eyes rest on it, her sad smile returning. There should have been a fifth with you, and more, but there’s only so much you can mourn.

“Let’s go pay our respects to the Empire,” Feferi says, her voice clear and carrying. The bridge scrambles into motion, and as the hum of the ship being powered starts to pick up, Aradia reaches out and takes your hand. You accept it without a conscious thought, eyes locked on the navigational displays, but when she squeezes you squeeze back.

It’s time to make all of this worth it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So! We made it, guys. Thank you so, so much for sticking with me through the thick and thin that has been this fic, and thank you for trusting me to break your hearts. I hope that the pieces that resolved well in this chapter helped to make up for it.
> 
> OLOH has turned into a world with a lot more potential than I ever realised, and while I think another 150k monster is beyond me, I do have rather a history of being unable to let my worlds go. So my true purpose in making the [onextendedvacation](http://www.onextendedvacation.tumblr.com) blog dedicated to OLOH is revealed! There's a lot still up in the air that I am sure you guys are curious about and would like to see written, and I am also certain that I owe a few of you fix-it fic. For the next week, I'll be taking fic requests over there to kick things off, but I'd also love to be able to keep it going, making a sequel of sorts out of ficlets of what people want to see.
> 
> As a final note, if you are confused by some of the events in this chapter, might I mysteriously recommend [Sights on Heaven](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2781482/chapters/6239816)? (And, of course, [Distrait first](http://archiveofourown.org/series/38968), since reading Sights on Heaven without the context of Distrait will simply raise more questions.)
> 
> I love you guys. Thanks, again, for making this a place I always wanted to come back to <3.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [life doesn't let you play nice (Our Lives On Holiday remix)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/720849) by [Elemental](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elemental/pseuds/Elemental)
  * [Beg to Dream and Differ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3928180) by [temporalDecay](https://archiveofourown.org/users/temporalDecay/pseuds/temporalDecay)
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